Maya's Tale
by JaganshiKenshin
Summary: Back in middle school, Kurama (with Hiei's assistance) rescued Kitajima Maya from the monstrous Yatsude. Now, nearly a decade later, they face a new, eerie challenge.
1. Maya's Tale: Prologue

Disclaimer: Kenshin does not own the Yuu Yuu Hakusho characters (they are the property of Togashi Yoshihiro et al), and does not make any money from said characters.

What Kenshin **does** own, however, are all the original characters in this work. Any attempt to "borrow" these characters will be met with the katana, or worse.

_Idiot Beloved_ takes place shortly after the Dark Tournament; _Firebird Sweet_ directly follows that timeline. For reference, I use a combination of the subtitled YYH anime and the American manga, plus some of the CD dramas.

Have you ever wondered what happened to Kitajima Maya, who appeared in the YYH manga extra and CD drama, "Two Shots?" Here is her story.

The action takes place right after the long story arc of _The Book of Cat With Moon._

Title: Maya's Tale (C1: Prologue)

Author: JaganshiKenshin

Genre: Action/Adventure, General

Rating: K+/PG-13

Summary: On a lonely street in a derelict neighborhood, two sisters huddle in fear of a mysterious man.

A/N: As always, thank you for reading this, and I appreciate your reviews!

Maya's Tale (1: Prologue)

by

Kenshin

Though elderly, the Kawasaki sisters were neither cowards nor fools.

"Come away from the window, Ruth," called Olivia. "It's past midnight."

"He's out again," murmured Ruth.

"Oh, dear. Well, all the more reason to come away." Nevertheless, Olivia joined her sister to peer out the parlor's long lace curtains.

Their mother had been British; their father Japanese. Being of an industrious nature, dealing in antiquities, both parents had left their daughters not only a business and a tidy inheritance, but a Victorian house in a then-fashionable neighborhood.

In its heyday some 50 years ago, the street had been alive with the bustle of familiies: mothers pushing their little ones in strollers, students peddling off to school, fathers returning home from work.

Today, over half the houses were unoccupied.

The parlor was illuminated by a single brass lamp on the drum table in the far corner. It cast a warm, dim circle of light on the wing chair next to it, and was only meant to read by. But when Olivia glanced out the window, she fought the urge to turn it off altogether.

A street lamp bathed the sidewalk with furtive, icy light. Across the street, a rambling single-story house crouched like a sleeping beast, lightless and ominous.

"I can't see him."

"The streetlight," said Ruth. "He's behind it."

Having enjoyed the benefit of a pleasant, peaceful, family, both sisters were eager to re-create this in their own lives. It was not to be.

Younger than Ruth by some three years, Olivia had married three times, and each time the marriage had ended without the comfort of children, until she realized the fault lay with her.

Ruth had remained single. Both sister's generous mothering instincts were poured out onto every living soul lucky enough to cross their paths.

"There," whispered Ruth. "He just stepped out. Can he see us, do you think?"

"The way you carry on, you'd think he could _hear_ us."

Sometimes, Olivia and Ruth spoke of selling the house, moving to a high-rise in a busier section of town.

But in the first place, the market being what it was, the street being what it was, who would buy?

In the second, this was their _home._ They were too stubborn to leave.

Ruth pointed. "He's got that camera, again."

Olivia lowered her voice to a whisper as well. "He gives me the shakes."

Strolling down the street was a tall man, of European descent, dressed in a long, fur-collared overcoat, as though for a Russian winter, with gloves red as blood and a fur hat, for all that it was April.

Judging by the loose skin of his jowls, he was in his 60s, and no one could say whether the neat moustache and goatee were an attempt to disguise or to emphasize that age.

The overall effect would be considered charming, or even comical, if not for his sinister aura.

"I can hear his footsteps," fretted Ruth. "I swear it."

Though not as susceptible to flights of fancy as dear Ruth, Olivia thought she could hear them, too: slow, measured, tolling out like a bell, _doom, doom. _

_As if he knows, as if he is putting on a display._

"It's so cold," sighed Ruth.

"And getting dark so early."

"As though spring is afraid to come."

"Just like it was fifty years ago."

They looked at one another then, a hard measuring look. Had the time come to open the Vault?

What does he do with that camera?" fretted Ruth.

"Perhaps he photographs the moon," said Olivia, seeking to reassure her sister. "Or the clouds. Or houses."

"Don't say that, Olivia. Don't even think it!"

He stopped then, swiveling his head toward the house.

Olivia's mouth went dry. "That sweet little girl," she whispered. "You don't suppose-"

Ruth made no reply, but in the cold, dimly-lit parlor, she clutched at her sister's hand.

-30-

(To be continued: Early-morning television fare: alien abductions, Bigfoot, and ghosts)


	2. Beginning

Please read Disclaimer in Chapter One.

Title: Maya's Tale (C2: Beginning)

Author: JaganshiKenshin

Genre: Action/Adventure, General

Rating: K+/PG-13 (for anime-style fight scenes/language)

Summary: Home alone, a girl cheers herself with spooky TV fare.

A/N: Nearly ten years after her forgotten abduction by the monster Yatsude and her rescue courtesy of Hiei and Kurama, Kitajima Maya ponders how her life turned out.

"A whole new wonderful world might open up!"

Maya's Tale (2: Beginning)

by

Kenshin

_Dear Diary,_

_Father is cross with me again. I suppose it's because of that girl. Or maybe he has other reasons. With Father, one never knows. It's been lonely here without my sisters, so I can't help but watch. Watching eases my distress, which has been growing of late._

_I wonder whether anyone can 'hear' me._

_It seems foolish to think so, as I have not spoken of this distress to anyone. But I am afraid. So very afraid._

0-0-0-0-0

"I'm home!" Kicking off her shoes, Kitajima Maya stepped from the genkan and entered the apartment in stocking feet.

No one welcomed her, for no one was there.

In spite of the cozy warmth, her shoulders drooped with a momentary draining of courage and cheer.

Not that she had a bad life, not that she was complaining! She had a decent job, clothes to wear, a roof over her head and food to eat. When her father returned from his business trip to France, he would bring her a thoughtful gift, as always.

It was just that, in the years since she'd graduated, nothing exciting ever seemed to happen.

Still. The Adventure Club was meeting Friday afternoon. So at least she had that to anticipate. And maybe one of the other girls would have good news.

The club, which consisted of Maya, plus Riku-the-embellisher, Chikako-the-skeptic, and Ayumi-the-follower, gathered at various coffee shops to laugh, talk over important TV shows, and also to report Real Life Encounters With The Unknown.

They were still waiting for a single such encounter.

Maya felt the girls ought to launch expeditions in search of the Unknown, and not just passively wait for Bigfoot to jump into someone's lap. The others did not exactly disagree, but no steps had been taken to plan such an expedition. _Maybe,_ Maya thought, _I'll launch my own!_

Maya worked as a messenger for Quicksilver Couriers, which provided a black Yamaha Zuma for out-of-town deliveries. She liked the sturdy 125 cc scooter, because it resembled a comical Bug-Eyed Monster, and it led to flights of fancy: Maya the Alien Hunter, and Her Trusty Companion Zuma.

Her job as a courier gave her a sense of freedom, with an opportunity to roam the city and its outskirts.

Although Maya had drunk some miso soup for breakfast, and although the apartment was warm, she'd been out on a couple of early morning calls. She felt chilly and hungry.

_Still morning, so I guess another breakfast is in order. _ She went to the kitchen, filled a kettle with water for tea. Grabbing a fresh package of rice crackers, she tore it open and tipped the crisp, crackling discs into a blue bowl that had been Mom's favorite. Bowl in hand, she scurried to the living room.

Luna-P was waiting for her. "Hello, Luna," she trilled.

There was no reply, for Luna-P was a stuffed toy, a pillow really, round and black and softly huggable. But though only a pillow, Luna had kind, understanding eyes, and endless patience for Maya's chatter.

Maya put a cracker in her mouth and the bowl on the coffee table. She pulled Luna into her lap, picked up the TV remote, and started flipping channels.

Boring stock market reports, soap operas she didn't like, silly kid's shows.

Luna was also unimpressed.

Though it was modest, even cramped, the apartment seemed huge with only Maya and Luna-P present. Besides the small living room, there were two bedrooms, a bath, and a kitchen that did triple duty as a study, meal preparation zone, and eatery.

Selling their house had been the right thing to do, of course, and Maya was glad that Father had done so. Still...

The teakettle whistled before Maya found a program to watch, and she hurried to brew her tea. Back with the hot tea, she munched crackers and flipped channels.

She still could not settle. The shapeless green sweatshirt she wore made her feel dowdy. Maya thought about changing clothes, but she might get another job call, and she had no desire to freeze.

At last, something worth watching: a re-run of Alien Abduction Weekly.

At their upcoming meeting, the girls would discuss this program. Riku would claim to have been abducted, but both Chikako and Maya could tell Riku was just grabbing her narrative off the TV and re-hashing it for their supposed benefit.

As usual, Maya had nothing to report. Fearing the Adventure Club was on its last legs, she had tried, over the course of the year, to talk herself into believing that an alley cat ducking behind a sushi restaurant was actually a creature from another dimension, or that the flickering orb just outside the park was not merely a defective street light but a flying saucer.

But her conscience would not allow this, and besides, Luna would be disappointed in her.

When she tried to come up with Strange Encounters, Maya knew she was reaching, fabricating, making things up.

And yet-and yet-

-buried in a tangled thicket of memory, was an incident, no more than a scene really, vivid but fleeting, a moving dream glimpsed as if through fog-

A slimy crawling thing, and a boy she'd known in school, who was good-looking, green-eyed, with rust-red hair. And the boy saying something about the smelly crawling thing-

-then the flash of a blade, and steely hands grabbing her shoulders from behind-

No. The harder Maya struggled to recall the incident, the faster it swirled back into mist.

Maybe it was just a nightmare.

"If I could speak to Mom," she told Luna, "things would be different." How she longed for such a talk. Could aliens help her achieve that? As for Mr. Muktananda, he was always saying the breakthrough was 'just around the corner.'

She took Luna's silence for deep thought.

Luna was right. It had been so long. Maybe there was no breakthrough. _No! Stop that line of thought right now! A girl has to believe in something._

On the TV screen, a young man nervously detailed the indignities he had suffered at the hands of the space aliens, whom he described as gray, with enormous black eyes, and a cold, efficient manner, which Riku would repeat Friday and claim it had been herself who suffered at the hands of the Grays, as they were called by those in the know.

"I would show those Grays a thing or two," Maya confided to Luna. "If they abducted me, I'd be studying _them!_"

But what would aliens think of her ragged green sweatshirt? No, that wouldn't do. Dressing well gave a girl confidence.

Of course, to find a ghost might prove even better than aliens. Space aliens-how could you have anything in common with someone from a whole other planet? At least with ghosts, they used to be people. They used to be alive. Some of them probably had better fashion sense than Maya.

She really should wear something nice. She had let her appearance go too much of late.

Because she had the strangest feeling that things were about to change. Something _different_ was coming her way.

With a tingle of excitement, she hugged Luna-P and whispered, "Just you wait. It's gonna be so _cool!_"

-30-

(To be continued: Kurama visits Hiei, bearing gifts and an ulterior motive.)


	3. A Necessary Deception

Please read Disclaimer in Chapter One.

Title: Maya's Tale (C3: A Necessary Deception)

Author: JaganshiKenshin

Genre: Action/Adventure, General

Rating: K+/PG-13

Summary: When Kurama wants to find an old acquaintance, he has no idea what he's up against.

A/N: As always, thanks for reading this, and I appreciate your reviews!

"She's a human girl! I don't dare!"

Maya's Tale (3: A Necessary Deception)

by

Kenshin

Hiei answered the door with a grunt of greeting, balancing a laptop in one hand, scarcely looking at Kurama.

His hair bristled like blue-black flames, a lightning-strike of white on the forelock; his crimson eyes bore a look of intense concentration, but that was merely business as usual.

There was the smell of good cooking from the kitchen, but Hiei appeared oblivious to that as well. The fact that Hiei did not remark on the aroma, nor even glance at Kurama's gift of Suntory whisky, constituted a radical departure from the norm.

Hiei retreated to a corner desk in the living room.

Setting the Suntory on a hall table, Kurama followed. His back to Kurama, Hiei was muttering at the laptop.

Kurama was tired, and bringing up the subject of Kitajima Maya was going to be awkward any way you cut it.

He was so busy working as a physician's assistant and studying for his upcoming Chem exam that he had almost cancelled this dinner invitation. He relented; the nature of his problem made it crucual to enlist Hiei's help.

But he _was_ tired, and not sleeping well, and thinking at about three-quarters capacity. Clumsy though the opening gambit was, Kurama plunged in. "Kaa-san's been nagging me about grandkids again."

"Then this is your lucky day." Hiei didn't look up. "I have a couple to sell you cheap."

Intrigued despite his urgency, Kurama said, "What happened?"

In reply, Hiei swiveled the laptop around. Black pixels like spiders swarmed from the center of the screen out, devouring it in darkness. Hiei uttered a single word: "Michael."

"Your son did this? And he's only eight. Impressive."

"His idea of a joke."

"But why are you selling _Cecilia?_" Michael's fraternal twin was a model of decorum.

"Don't want Michael to be lonely in his new home."

"It is," Kurama said at length, "frequently difficult to tell whether you're joking."

"Who's joking? I'll even throw in CeeCee's pet hamster."

"Where are they now?"

"In the dungeon, probably racking up my phone bill."

"That's one clever hamster," said Kurama.

"You know who I meant." Hiei scowled at the blackened screen. "Grandchildren. What did your esteemed mother really do? Passed some kid in a stroller and smiled at him?" Shutting the clamshell case, Hiei muttered, "He broke it. He can fix it." Then he went to the hall table, unearthed the Suntory, and sloshed about half a liter into a heavy crystal tumbler.

If this had been anyone but Hiei, Kurama would have been dialing the paramedics. But Hiei's hummingbird metabolism insured even this outlandish amount of alcohol would burn off like early morning dew under a blowtorch.

"I'd offer you some," said Hiei, knocking back a long swallow, "but I disapprove of children drinking in my home."

Kurama snorted.

"So do I." Shayla Kidd sashayed in from the kitchen, wiping her hands on a frilled green apron.

Shay-san was a transplanted American, a gray-eyed, elfin girl possessed of a fierce beauty, which she always disarmed with straight-from-the-shoulder chumminess. She wore yellow clamdiggers and a butter-yellow polo shirt. With her bright hair, the overall effect was that of an animated marigold.

Commandeering the drink from Hiei, she gave him The Look. "Shouldn't you be out back incinerating the main course?"

"Defeat," grumbled Hiei. "She-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed has spoken." Giving the whisky one last longing gaze, Hiei strode into the kitchen, snagged a plate loaded with raw chicken, and led Kurama out the back door into the neatly-tended garden.

"We're out of earshot." Hiei jerked his head at the house. "That's double-paned glass."

"Why would I want to be out of Shay-san's earshot?"

"Try not to make me laugh. Incinerating a chicken requires strict concentration."

A hibachi grill sat smoking an old picnic table. Squinting at the fire, Hiei went to the charcoal bin, scooped a couple more coals into a starter chimney, then casually ignited them with a forefinger.

"Looks good," said Kurama.

"The coals or the chicken?"

"You must save a bundle on matches."

"Good. Pretend you're talking about something manly." The hiss of seasoned meat hitting a scorching-hot grill rose. Hiei was too busy to glance at Kurama. "You scared me back there."

"It's about to get worse. There's a person from my past I've been thinking about."

"A person? That narrows it down."

"I think you know her, too."

At last Hiei turned, and gave Kurama such a piercing look that Kurama felt he must be reading his mind.

"Are you seeing anyone?" Hiei said.

An unusual question, coming from Hiei. It sent a chill down Kurama's spine.

The two of them had been friends and allies for nearly a decade, and knew one another well, yet Hiei could still surprise him. "Seeing anyone?" said Kurama. "Not exactly."

Hiei prodded the bubbling chicken pieces with a forefinger, then flipped them. "Describe the 'not' part."

"I go out with a girl or two from my classes. Coffee. Movies. But they aren't-"

"-Maya," Hiei concluded.

Kurama went bloodless. "Who said anything about Maya?"

"Remember who you're talking to."

Kurama sighed. "I might have realized."

Kitajima Maya.

A lively, enthusiastic girl from Kurama's middle school, Maya had been interested in 'the occult,' as she put it, and was able to see low-level youkai, meaning she had a sixth sense.

One evening, while walking home together, Maya and Kurama had been attacked by Hiei. Eventually, it got sorted out: Hiei thought Kurama was part of a gang who might have captured his sister, Yukina. He'd meant no harm to Maya; she was just... in the way.

But while Hiei and Kurama were in the heat of battle, Maya was abducted and brought to the thug Yatsude, who had a taste for human flesh.

It had been Hiei's aura of bloodlust that alerted Kurama to his presence. Now, nearly a decade later, Hiei was calmer, more in control-and ten times as dangerous.

But back then, neither Hiei nor Kurama was powerful enough to defeat Yatsude. They joined forces and crushed him, and retrieved Maya-

-who was in love with Kurama.

Whatever else his faults, Hiei was not deaf.

Hiei busied himself with the chicken. Perhaps Kurama could diffuse Hiei's keen insight with some well-chosen insults regarding the picket-fence domesticity of the scene.

But Hiei hadn't changed _that_ much. Kurama might end up sizzling on the grill alongside the chicken.

So he said, somewhat melodramatically, "I don't dare contact Maya. She's a human girl."

"Don't look now, but so is Shay-san."

"She's different."

"Different how?"

"She packs heat."

Hiei snorted. "That little mouse gun?"

"I meant her powers." Shayla Kidd was a Spellcaster. "And she's a seasoned fighter." Also somewhat melodramatically, Kurama lifted his head, adding, "Maya is... an innocent."

"Time's up."

"I don't know whether to be relieved or surprised."

"These are boneless, skinless chicken breasts."

"That explains everything."

"Which means expensive. They burn, I'm blaming you." Hiei had the fragrant chicken on a plate in a flash. "Open the door for me. I haven't got all minute."

Shrugging, Kurama conceded the first part of the battle.

Dinner was excellent, as usual. In addition to the seared chicken, there was also American-style potato salad, arugula dressed with clementines and sesame oil, and coconut cake.

Michael and Cecilia ate in the dungeon (otherwise known as 'the finished basement').

After dinner, Hiei uncorked a brandy, and Shayla Kidd uncorked a surprise. Turning her gumdrop eyes on Kurama, she purred, "When was the last time you saw this girl?"

Kurama raised both eyebrows at Hiei.

"I didn't say a thing." Hiei measured two fingers of brandy into a snifter. "She's a Spellcaster, not a mind-reader." Violating his own 'rule,' he passed the brandy to Kurama. "Though she _is_ female."

"That's so sweet of you to notice." The female Spellcaster rose from the table and busied herself with the phone.

This was not going as planned. Far from passing off a simple deception, and enlisting Hiei's help, Kurama was on the run. A worried frown creased his brow. "Who's she calling?"

"Have the brandy," Hiei urged. "You'll need it."

"Not Maya?" A flush rose on Kurama's face that had nothing to do with the brandy. "You wouldn't-"

"I just did." Shay-san held out the phone. "Here."

"I can see where Michael gets his-"

"Don't insult my intelligent and industrious son," Shay-san interrupted. "That won't get you off the hook."

"Sometimes," Kurama muttered, "I almost hate you."

"No, you don't." With a smile that was nine parts honey and one part wasp venom, Shayla Kidd collared both Hiei and the laptop, then dragged them down into the dungeon.

Privacy. Kurama cleared his throat.

Of course Maya remembered him. She had, in fact, just been thinking of him.

And that, thought Kurama, going on automatic pilot for small talk, was in itself strange.

Because Kaa-san's offhanded remark, which had exactly nothing to do with Kurama, and had in fact gone exactly as Hiei had surmised, was just an excuse to broach the subject.

Kurama had been thinking of Kitajima Maya, too. But as though she was in danger.

That recurring dream of his-what if it was true?

Even with a few rough edges scraped off, Hiei was still Hiei. Had Kurama mentioned his dream, and suspicions, Hiei would say something like, "Let's go kill whoever's threatening her. Come on, it'll be fun."

Hence, the necessary deception.

Not that Kurama would mind seeing the girl again. But now, when he was so overloaded-

Kurama tuned back into the phone conversation. Maya's voice was as bright and sweet as he remembered. But that, he reminded himself, was not the point.

By the time Maya had agreed to meet with Kurama, Hiei and Shay-san emerged from the dungeon. The laptop remained.

There was still some cake. All innocence now, Shayla Kidd angled the cake stand at Kurama, but he shook his head, wondering, "How did you track down Kitajima Maya's phone number _and_ have time to make potato salad?"

"You're not the only detective around here," she replied.

"Women," muttered Hiei.

"You really are too kind, Shay-san," Kurama said hastily. "I sometimes worry that I may be imposing on you."

She ambled into the living room with a sliver of cake and a brandy for herself. "Imposing?"

"As in using too much of your time, energy and resources."

"Oh, that." She put her feet up on an ottoman and yawned. "No need for guilt. I'm sticking you with the dishes."

(To be continued: In a lonely house on the edge of the woods, a man receives a curious delivery.)

-30-


	4. Von Brandt

Please read Disclaimer in Chapter One.

Title: Maya's Tale (C4: Von Brandt)

Author: JaganshiKenshin

Genre: Action/Adventure, General

Rating: K+/PG-13 (for anime-style fight scenes/language)

Summary: Kurama tells himself there's no real threat to Maya, but-

A/N: The Bartholomew Tree is said to be a symbol of luck, hope, and resurrection.

_Idiot Beloved_ takes place shortly after the Dark Tournament; _Firebird Sweet_ directly follows that timeline. In order for certain character development to make sense, you might read those fics in order.

"My dear, one day you will submit."

Maya's Tale (4: Von Brandt)

by

Kenshin

The following day, Kurama attempted a somewhat more direct approach, and Hiei's response was reassuringly predictable.

"Some bastard's threatening this Maya girl?" Hiei grinned. "Let's find him and kill him."

A knifing wind tore through Kurama's hair and harried the temperature down, making him glad of his jacket. He stood with Hiei near a tree, in the wooded area surrounding Rokurokubi Block, where Yojigen Mansion was situated.

No one called it Rokurokubi Block; among themselves, the Shadow Warriors called it Derelict's Row, for its many on-the-skids or frankly abandoned houses.

A few homes still maintained a genteel dignity, but the neighborhood's character hung in a precarious balance.

Sometimes it seemed to Kurama that the bad characteristics of the neighborhood had spread, even to the surrounding woods. The plants were stunted in places, overgrown in others.

It didn't seem healthy.

Hiei had his sword out, wiping its blade on the sleeve of his sweat jacket.

No one who hadn't known Hiei for years would suspect him of compassion, but it was there.

Not the lip-trembling, teary-eyed brand of compassion loved by media outlets the world over, all display and no backbone; but a cool, tough gracious sort that knew you in and out, didn't waste words, and had your back, too.

Hiei squinted at the sword, then stropped it again. "Then that line about your biological clock ticking was hogwash."

"And here I thought I had you fooled."

"Pre-med students don't breed. It's costly." Hiei shifted his grip on the sword. "And you're too young."

"Look who's talking."

"I'm different."

"As in superior?"

"You said it, not me." Hiei tossed the sword high in the air, watched it rise and spin end-over-end, then caught it, overhand. "Besides-it was clumsy of you. As though you didn't think it worth your time to brew me a more plausible story."

"Point taken. But I-"

"If I didn't know you better, I might be inclined to feel insulted." Hiei, who often trained in peculiar ways, flung his sword at the tree.

_THWOK._ Sword struck tree. Kurama said, "I suppose I should be grateful that found its target in the tree and not my gut."

"I have no idea what you're talking about."

Hiei had thrown his sword in a spear-like manner before, notably when he, Kurama, Kuwabara and Yuusuke were assigned to wrangle the Four Holy Beasts.

Kurama retrieved the sword by means of a Thrashvine. This was exercise for him, too, in a way, not merely an expenditure of muscle-power, but also a workout for his aura.

Not that a Thrashvine took much coaxing. A relative of ivy, the Thrashvine could hog-tie an opponent, and the more the opponent struggled, the tighter the bonds grew. And it used far less spirit power than Kurama's standard weapon, the Rose Whip.

"It's not as though we have a specific target," Kurama explained, using the vine to reel in the sword.

"You raised my hopes, now you dash them."

Kurama decided he would not yet mention the dream, though it woke him each night, robbing him of sleep: the image of a girl, floating, a camera, a sense of urgency. "I know of no specific threat to the girl. Just a feeling."

"Probably something you ate." Hiei went to work in earnest, hurling the sword deeper into the tree with each attempt, until it took quite a bit of power for Kurama to haul it out again.

"You're killing that tree," Kurama said.

"It's dead already. I'm doing the tree guys a favor."

Hiei was right. The twisted hulk of a Bartholomew tree, a distant relative of the swamp maple, might have been beautiful in its day, but it had long since gone to Tree Paradise.

This, too, seemed wrong. Bartholomew trees are long-lived, and grow to great height, but this particular specimen was stunted, like a deformed hand clawing upward from a swamp.

It seemed pathetic, with its gnarled gray bark and leafless branches, as though begging to be put out of its misery.

_Thok._ Hiei was doing his best to oblige.

Kurama's Thrashvine drew the sword across the sparse grass, Hiei bent to retrieve it, then the whole routine began anew.

Hiei seemed to improve his aim, systematically planting the blade of his katana four or five inches to the right with each throw. He really was going to bring the tree down.

Kurama said, "Next time _you_ can pull the sword out."

Hiei was unruffled. "Have it your way. What do you propose to do about the girl?"

"Watch. Wait. Remain alert."

"Call me when the battle starts." Hiei strolled to the tree, yanked out his sword, then stepped back.

Hacked to bits by systematic throws of the katana, the tree gave a deep, shuddering groan and toppled over.

To Kurama's ears, the sound of its fall echoed like a funeral bell.

0-0-0-0-0

The girl was blushing. How wonderful.

Medium in height, slimly built, she clutched the envelope to her breast as though holding a shield.

Though wearing a tweed overcoat, she hopped from one foot to the other to keep warm.

Von Brandt lingered in the doorway, studying her.

Such a cold April day. If she would only come in for tea. But the time was not yet right.

Neither Von Brandt's house nor the property was large in terms of its footprint, for it had been built in a cul-de-sac that backed up to the woods. Three storys high, with rounded cupolas painted white and bronze, and high round windows, it was guarded on all sides by fine, old wrought-iron fencing.

A strong breeze teased open the girl's coat. She clutched both coat and envelope tighter.

"Won't you accept my offer this time?"

"Mr... Mr. Von Brandt..." Her voice was clear and sweet and highly provoking.

Blue eyes. Deep brown hair, shining like a mink's pelt, but somewhat in disarray, and in need of combing. He waited.

"Sorry-maybe some other time, but I still have packages to deliver. Here!" She thrust the envelope at him with both hands.

When her arms began to tremble with fatigue, he at last slid the envelope from her. During the exchange, one of his fingers brushed hers. She gave a little squeak, as though she had received an electrical shock.

How musical, that squeak.

She whirled, then clattered down the steps. From there she ran down the walkway into the street, presumably to enter a waiting vehicle, or mount a bicycle, or proceed on foot.

It made no difference in what manner she left. She could not escape.

He watched her to the last, as she passed through the iron gates, her little heels flying, the hem of her coat flapping.

When she turned sharply left, and was lost to his sight, Von Brandt closed the door, and regarded the delivery.

The manila envelope weighed next to nothing. Considering what was inside it, it should be heavy as gold.

The envelope was a bit dusty from its journey. He licked a forefinger, touched it to the dust, then inserted the finger into his mouth. He shut his eyes in delight.

The wings of time, the flesh of the target, the massacre to follow. He swallowed with a deep sense of satisfaction.

When he opened his eyes, _she_ was standing in the hall.

He was furious. "Didn't I tell you to stay in your room?"

She spoke eagerly, awkwardly. "Will the girl come in next time? Will she have tea with us?"

"You never were one for obedience, were you?"

She hung her head. "No, Father."

"All your sisters knew how to behave."

"Yes, Father."

"They did as they were told."

She did not respond.

"In time, you will have other sisters. And I am sure they will not specialize in defiance. Now go to your room."

When he was alone again with the package, Von Brandt walked down the marble hallway, his footsteps echoing throughout its beautiful chill.

He stopped before the door that was locked with a large blood-red key.

He opened the room only to maintain and add to what lay within, and it held many secrets.

Von Brandt was a patient man. Every fifty years, he selected a girl, a queen, really, for the highest of honors he could bestow on a woman.

It was his own particular brand of coronation. Patience was a virtue, or so it was said, but the days grew long.

_Some day,_ he promised himself. _Some day, I will open this door and I will not be alone. Sooner rather than later, I will open it for the chosen one. And I will carry her over the threshold._

-30-

(To be continued: The Toad Palace awaits.)


	5. Toad

Please read Disclaimer in Chapter One.

Title: Maya's Tale (C5: Toad)

Author: JaganshiKenshin

Genre: Action/Adventure, General

Rating: K+/PG-13 (for anime-style fight scenes/language)

Summary: No one knows his real name or origin, but Toad knows _them._

A/N: Our friends travel once again to the Myu-Myu district, which plays a prominent role in a few stories. The 'thief,' mentioned here in passing, co-stars in _A Cowboy's Work Is Never Done._

I'm happy that there are still YYH fans, and that some of you read my stories!

"A pleasure to see you again!"

Maya's Tale (5: Toad)

by

Kenshin

Toad.

No one knew his true name. That's what they called him.

Hiei disliked toads.

He disliked them on general principle-nasty, warty, ugly things-and he disliked them on specifics because he always seemed to be running afoul of them.

White Sands Serpent, who had nearly killed both Hiei and his Firebird, Shayla Kidd, employed toad henchmen. One of the thieves who'd raised Hiei possessed toad-ish qualities.

Yet here they were, in the chilly dawn, approaching Toad's palace: Hiei, Shay-san, and Kurama. Hiei in black leather jacket and black jeans. Shayla Kidd, in a taupe woolen dress with a gray wool coat; overdressed, Hiei thought, for their meeting with producers and directors later this morning concerning a new job.

Kurama in a camel's hair blazer, looking like he wished it was an overcoat, clutching a white gift bag from which gilt paper and silk poked out. _Always bearing gifts,_ Hiei thought.

"That laptop," Hiei began.

"Don't tell me-" murmured Kurama.

Every now and then, the Shadow Warriors sought a consultation with Toad. Every now and then, Toad summoned them of his own accord, like today.

On the outside, Toad's palace was just another derelict building in Tokyo's ever-changing Myu-Myu district, but no one ever seemed to get around to wrecking it. Hiei suspected that, in some bizarre way, the building wasn't really 'there' at all.

This could be a tough neighborhood. None of them feared the neighborhood so much as what was inside this building.

Toad is a creature of mystery. He is _youkai,_ though he gives off an aura which Hiei can never quite pin down. Toad has proven invaluable in certain Agency cases, though he does not work for the Agency as such.

Shayla Kidd trades wisecracks with Toad, but always seems weak and enervated following their visits, and for this reason alone Hiei does not trust him.

The three of them tarried in front of the building made of cracked glass, shedding brick, and twisted metal.

"So." Kurama gave a little cough. "Still broken?"

"It's not Michael's fault," snapped Shayla Kidd.

They were delaying the inevitable, and Hiei knew it.

Finally Kurama opened the door and they stepped inside to a cloak of darkness, where grit and debris crunched underfoot.

Whenever they came to Toad Palace, Hiei always felt trapped in the pages of a fairy tale. One of those fairy tales in which everyone ended up with a severed head.

They inched forward. The scent of dust sifted over their shoulders. Inside, too, the building appeared to be an abandoned wreck, but here, no matter the time of day, it was always night.

Hiei stood in the midst of rubble and ruin, and possibly the bodies of those who had died trying to claw their way out.

Shayla Kidd slipped an icy hand into Hiei's, and squeezed. He felt the beating of her heart through her palm. It always took her like this at first. She would settle down.

The illusion of darkness lasted only a few moments. Then light bloomed, trickling first from the floor and rising as though the walls were alive and awakening. The light swept away darkness to reveal a lobby. Walls of tawny marble, punctuated with gold-veined mirrors. A crystal chandelier blazed from the vaulted ceiling.

A black leopard strode in from an alcove to the left, its eyes gleaming chartreuse, its whiskers like threads of spun glass, the faint shadow spots on its coat shifting and rippling as it prowled closer.

They stood their ground. This was the footman. He didn't want them for dinner.

A carpeted hallway branched off to the right. The footman turned, padded down the carpeting, and reluctantly they followed.

The walls and ceiling were brighter than the lobby, and made of a strange matte metal that could have been pewter, brushed stainless steel, even silver. The seamless walls showed no doorways, not even a crack, nor any means of illumination. It was just a metal tube.

The footman stopped halfway down the hall. A seam began to open in the wall, from the floor up, as though it was a zipper unzipping. It formed into an arched doorway, which slid aside to reveal what Hiei thought of as The Silver Bullet.

This was an oval-shaped chamber of the same metal as the hall. No buttons. No call panel. No means of illumination, just a milky diffusion of light.

"Here I must leave you." The black leopard spoke in formal Japanese. "Midori will meet you when the elevator stops."

They stepped inside. The door slid shut. The seam disappeared. "I don't like this," grumbled Hiei.

"You never do," said Kurama.

Shay-san clutched Hiei's hand.

The Silver Bullet took off like a silent rocket to Mars. There was a shimmer of motion, a twist of hypersonic speed. Hiei's lungs felt like they were being pressed up into his throat, as though the Bullet was rising.

They could just as well have been falling.

The level of light dimmed. Shay-san's grip on Hiei's hand tightened. Full darkness now. As though they plummeted into ocean depths where no light could penetrate.

_That sense of pitching over the edge of Hyouga again, as a furious, fiery infant, falling, falling, bound like a mummy._

Devouring dark spread throughout Hiei's thoughts, pressing away reason and sanity. The elevator was littered with the bodies of those who had suffocated for want of light.

Someone was crushing his hand. Someone he should know.

Just when he could not stand it another second-

-the elevator opened.

Even Hiei needed a moment to recover.

It always went this way. He could only imagine what the others felt, but no one ever wanted to talk about it.

Midori stood in another carpeted hall, smiling at them. Three feet tall, with a child's face and voice, her black hair was twisted up into twin rolls, and her emerald robes were figured with golden butterflies, fluttering in a breeze that touched only her.

Midori bowed. "How are you today, esteemed guests? Such a pleasure to receive you. I see also that you have brought a gift. How thoughtful."

Kurama found his voice. "Please take no account of this unworthy trifle."

The 'nothing' was a perfect honeydew melon, wrapped in white silk, costing the equivalent of a hundred dollars.

"If you will follow me, please." Relieving Kurama of the bag, Midori led them down the hall, a hall that brought to mind the great palaces of old, and then through another room.

This room had deep ruby carpeting, figured with gold and green, swallowing the sound of their footsteps. Floor-to-ceiling drapes of the same colors covered every wall.

There was also a vast fish tank in one corner, occupied by a number of dun-colored _osoi inochi:_ Slowpokes, a form of dragon-koi. Each Slowpoke was a mere four feet long, and therefore quite young; the species continues growing up until the moment of death, and can reach 100 feet in length.

Though alive, they resembled corpses afloat.

At the far end of the room, Toad occupied a gilt mahogany throne on a raised platform. Manlike in size, toadish in shape, he wore a silken robe stitched over with gold-and-silver suns, moons and stars. The robe's loose collar displayed his soft, distended throat. His olive-drab skin made an unpleasant background for the wet pink nostrils and the occasional flash of a sticky yellow tongue.

The jewel in the crown of his head resembled a milky opal as large as a hen's egg, gleaming with an eerie fluorescent light that cast a beam onto the low ceiling.

Beyond Toad, half-open French doors led to a patio bestowing an impossible flash of sunlight, an impossible fresh breeze.

On either side of the throne stood an otter in a red jerkin. Hiei could not tell what the otters were, whether they were merely animals or _youkai._ He could not tell what Toad was. He felt stripped of his own power, and he hated feeling helpless.

Toad remained seated. Carunculated hands tipped in black claws spread in greeting. "Welcome, esteemed friends."

He had a beautiful voice, mellifluous and well-modulated, almost the equal of Shayla Kidd's, who, at this moment, was mute.

Midori handed Toad the gift. Toad unearthed the melon and exclaimed over its beauty, perfection, and aroma.

Cradling it in his lap like a baby, or a crystal ball, Toad exclaimed, "This is more than generous. I feel quite unworthy."

Hiei bit his tongue.

Kurama spoke. "What brings us here today?" There was tension in his voice, if you were looking for it.

"And why the three of us?" Hiei's face felt marble-stiff.

The otter on the left handed Toad a black lacquer tray, laden with a celadon teapot and mugs that might have been cut from enormous pieces of jade. Toad poured tea.

Shay-san still clutched Hiei's hand. This was not usual. By now, she should have shaken it off, cracked wise with Toad, anything but this white-knuckled tension.

"Sit down, my dear," purred Toad. One of the otters produced a chair. Shay-san sank into it. Hiei remained at her side watching Toad from narrowed, suspicious eyes.

If he managed to cut off the toad's head, would the lavish interior crumble into the same disrepair as the outside?

"I would not want my esteemed guests to leave without helping me dispose of this magnificent gift." The otter at Toad's right offered a silver platter; the one to his left, a silver knife. The objects flashed, brilliant, blinding.

Midori carved, revealing the creamy-jade interior, releasing the honeydew's sweet, musky scent. She handed the melon around.

"Relax." Toad chuckled, a sound like the ocean lapping sand. "It's not as though I'm charging you for this consultation."

"Consultation?" A piece of melon froze halfway to Kurama's mouth.

"Isn't it remarkable how much a melon, uncut, can resemble a crystal ball?"

Kurama frowned. "I don't follow."

"Quite so. I speak merely of the shape. Unlike that of a crystal ball, the melon's surface is of course opaque, and requires some knife-work to get to the insides."

Maybe Toad was trying to tell them something. Or maybe he was just being Toad.

When they finished the melon, Midori led them back to the Silver Bullet, and by the time they were out on the street again, Hiei's head was spinning, and his hand nearly pulped by Shayla Kidd's deathgrip.

For someone built like a pixie cowgirl, Hiei's Firebird could show surprising force.

"Th-that's it? That's all?" Shay-san's teeth were chattering. "Then why did T-toad-"

Kurama interrupted her. "Don't look now," he said, "But here comes trouble."

0-0-0-0-0

In the sanctuary of his study, Von Brandt scowled at the snapshot.

Every so often, he used a Polaroid-type camera with which to take pictures, rather than the exquisite Leica reserved for more leisurely pursuits. He used the instant camera when he needed to see an image quickly, and this was one such time.

For he had felt something, suspected something, and so last night, camera in hand, he had gone to the place of the beautifully stunted Bartholomew tree.

According to the evidence on this picture, his suspicions proved to be true.

Not only had he been shocked to find the tree had fallen, but angered to see the culprits revealed by the picture he took.

By the time Von Brandt had arrived on the scene, they had long since departed. But his camera was not limited merely to capturing images of the present.

Two young men near the tree, one with a sword and black hair, the other carrying nothing Von Brandt could _see_ being used as a weapon... but yet...

He had no doubt. They had destroyed the stunted tree.

And for that, they must pay.

-30-

(To be continued: Tea for three, side order of trouble.)


	6. Tea and Trouble

Please read Disclaimer in Chapter One.

Title: Maya's Tale (C6: Tea and Trouble)

Author: JaganshiKenshin

Genre: Action/Adventure, General

Rating: K+/PG-13 (for anime-style fight scenes/language)

Summary: Across town, a serving of trouble coincides with a serving of tea.

A/N: I find Maya to be such a neat character: bold, adventurous, daring enough to reveal her heart to Minamino back then, yet still vulnerable and wholly human.

_Idiot Beloved_ takes place shortly after the Dark Tournament; _Firebird Sweet_ directly follows that timeline. In order for certain character development to make sense, you might read those fics in order.

"We'll stop her, any way we can!"

Maya's Tale (6: Tea and Trouble)

by

Kenshin

Ruth opened the door to find a rather breathless Kitajima Maya, clutching both her tweed coat and a manila envelope.

The girl's dear pretty face was pink with cold, and her thick brown hair in disarray from wearing that helmet. Her smile seemed frostbitten.

"Maya, dear!" Ruth exclaimed. "Please come in and take some tea. You look as though you could use it."

The girl darted a longing glance past Ruth's shoulder. "N-no, well, as it happens, I'm running a little late-"

"Nonsense." Olivia came to the door and drew the girl inside, then slid the envelope from her hands. "Your employer can't be that big a Bolshevik, can he?"

"Mr. Quicksilver? No, I don't think so. At least I hope not! No, it's just that-well, my appointment-"

Knowing with whom the 'appointment' stood, Ruth decided that Maya needed tea more than she needed punctuality.

She relieved the envelope from Olivia, drawling, "Oh, that'll be the vase." Between them, she and Olivia took Maya's coat, then herded her into the parlor without seeming to, seating her at a pouffy silk ottoman near the tea tray.

"It's sooo warm in here. And you have my favorites!" Maya beamed at the butter cookies arrayed on a Meissen plate. "Well, if tea's already made..."

Going to a desk in the corner, Ruth deftly slit the envelope with a letter opener and tipped out a series of five photographs while Olivia poured tea. "Thank you for the delivery, dear."

"Truth is," said Maya, "I'm freezing. This is the last time I wear a dress on the job!"

The dress was in medium blue chambray that accented the color of Maya's eyes, a little outdated in style, but still good. "Oh, but you look so nice in it, dear."

"Not sitting on Zuma at a hundred miles an hour."

"A hundred?" Olivia smiled. "Is Zuma really so fast?"

"Well, maybe not a _hundred._ But you know."

At the laptop, Ruth tickled a few keys, then brought the photographs back so Olivia could study them as well.

"I tried it yesterday," said Maya. "The dress, I mean. Hopeless. It's twice as cold today."

"Yes, a bit unusual for April," remarked Ruth.

"It's like spring is in hiding," Maya agreed.

Sipping tea, nibbling cookies, delaying Maya, the sisters pondered pictures. "Oh, that _is_ a fine specimen!" cried Olivia.

It was a Sevres vase, in Old Paris green, footed, with a frilled neck, white raised scrollwork and a center floral motif. "And a very good price, I see," added Ruth. "Shall we?"

"I think so." Olivia and Ruth seldom acquired things to sell through mere photographs, no matter how detailed. "It will look splendid on the sideboard with seasonal flowers."

"Your garden is always so pretty!" Maya glanced at a photo of the vase. "This would be like bringing it indoors."

"Then we'll take it." Ruth went back to the computer and completed the transaction.

"And you, dear?" said Olivia. "Anything good to report?"

"There's this boy I knew in junior high," began Maya. Then she looked down and blushed.

"A boy?" Ruth hurried to the sofa. "Do go on."

"He contacted me a couple of days ago." Maya gazed dreamily around the room at nothing. "We're getting together soon."

"How lovely!" Ruth exclaimed.

Olivia gave them both a not-so-fast look. "What sort is he, this boy?"

Maya shrugged. "Who knows? It's been years and years."

"Well, what sort _was_ he, then?" Ruth prodded.

"Cute, as I remember," said Maya. "Brainy."

"Cute and brainy," repeated Olivia.

"Now this calls for more tea." Ruth reached for the teapot.

"As a celebration, you know," added Olivia.

"I'd love to," Maya sighed, "but I really can't be late."

Olivia said, gently. "Dear, I was thinking-"

"-as was I-" echoed Ruth.

"-that maybe this seance business isn't for you."

Maya looked up from her tea. "But, Miss Olivia..."

"Now, dear, listen." Ruth took the girl's cold little hands and peered earnestly into her wide blue eyes. "About this Muktananda of yours. Don't you think a departed loved one wouldn't need any 'medium' through whom to speak? Wouldn't such a person be able to do it without a middle-man?"

"Oh, but Miss Ruth! I think you're wrong about that. Why, if you were at a party in a foreign embassy, say French or Sri Lankan, you'd need a translator, wouldn't you?"

"Not for French," Ruth replied.

"Nor Sinhali," added Olivia.

"Though perhaps for Mandarin. I find the inflections rather exacting."

"Or Basque," said Olivia thoughtfully. "I was never able to master the intricacies of Basque."

"Well, forget the embassy thing," said Maya. "Bad analogy. More like you're traveling alone in a foreign land."

"That's not what I meant." Ruth patted the girl's hand. "Now, my dear, if you will listen a moment-"

"Oh, the time!" With a half-panicked glance at the mantle clock Maya jumped to her feet. "Sorry! Gotta run. We'll get into this again, okay?" Bidding them both farewell, she bounded out the door, all but leaving a breeze in her wake.

Ruth heard Maya's little Zuma fire up, then putter down the street. Her shoulders slumped in defeat. "We tried," she said, gathering the tea things.

Olivia rose to help her. "We shall try again," she said, with conviction. "We'll stop her, even if we have to lock her in the cupboard."

0-0-0-0-0

"Trouble?" Hiei repeated Kurama's warning. "Where?"

Some of the residents of the block were stirring, and Kurama didn't need binoculars to spot the gang of five young thugs. They were swaggering down the opposite side of the street, moving shoulder-to-shoulder in a wide-legged Yakuza stance, but they were not Yakuza.

One wore a red beret, and swung a length of chain. Another, his head shaven, carried a length of pipe over his shoulder like a baseball bat. The others probably had switchblades.

Shayla Kidd's teeth continued to chatter. Her obvious discomfort seemed to raise Hiei's level of anger. "Why'd that Toad bastard summon us here anyway?" he snapped.

No one had an answer, but Kurama was working on it.

He also knew that both Hiei and Shayla Kidd had a meeting today with a producer to discuss rehearsals for a music video, showcasing a rising young pop star known only as 'Zo.'

One eye on the approaching thugs, Kurama wondered if they would make that meeting.

"Don't feel so hot," mumbled Shayla Kidd. Her face was as white as tofu.

"Damn Toad."

"I don't think it's entirely Toad's fault," said Kurama.

Hiei bared his teeth. "It would _soothe_ me to stick him."

"I think it's just that forsaken elevator," Kurama continued. Across the street, the gang drew closer. Five husky kids, out on a cold morn for easy pickings and a little mayhem.

"She should've eaten something." Hiei scowled at Kurama as though holding him responsible for Shay-san's condition. "Every time we land a job she thinks she has to drop five pounds."

Shay-san was still looking wobbly. With one eye on the approaching gang, Kurama assured her, "You are not in the least bit five pounds too heavy."

She gave him a weak smile. "_You_ are a gentleman and a scholar and my new best friend."

The gang had spotted them. They were crossing the street.

"She's light-headed from low blood sugar," Hiei grumbled.

"I had some melon," she said. "You saw."

"The size of a fingernail."

Kurama interrupted. "As charming as it is to witness these little domestic scenes-"

"Look." Hiei gestured at Shay-san. "Is she fat?"

"No," Kurama replied. Though Shayla Kidd had her back to them, the gang was making steady progress, close enough now for Kurama to see that their faces were alight with happy malice. "Never. But-"

"Except when she was pregnant," Hiei amended. "Then it looked like she swallowed a Volkswagen."

Shayla Kidd got that gold-flame glare in her gray eyes.

In spite of the approaching gang, Kurama had to smile at Hiei. "You are nothing, Sir, if not a ledge-walker."

The thugs were ten steps away and picking up speed. The one with the chain swung it like a lariat, making it sing.

The noise must have drawn her attention, for Shayla Kidd glanced their way. That wash of gold fire rose until it gilded her eyes. Kurama had seen that look before.

He took a step back.

The thugs were on them. Hiei appeared to take no notice.

Eyes aflame, Shayla Kidd cranked herself around to face the gang and purred, "What can I _do_ for you boys?"

The words of the Spellcaster hung in the frigid morning air like a bright little bonfire.

The punks stopped, blanching.

The one with the chain spoke. "N-nothing, Ma'am!"

"Not a thing!" added the bald one.

As one, the five hulking predators spun, and, like frightened schoolboys, fled back down the street, and in all likelihood, to their beds to pull up the covers.

And Shay-san hadn't even unfurled her Command Voice.

"Kids." She shook her head in fond exasperation.

Hiei grinned.

"Is there a cab anywhere?" Shay-san glanced around the now-empty street.

"I'll call one if you eat something," Hiei replied.

"Fine. You win."

"Well." Kurama forced a smile. "I'd better go hit the books." They went their separate ways, Kurama pondering the triple coincidences of Maya, thugs and Toad.

-30-

(To be continued: Dinner is served.)


	7. Message of Rouge

Please read Disclaimer in Chapter One.

Title: Maya's Tale (C7: Message of Rouge)

Author: JaganshiKenshin

Genre: Action/Adventure, General

Rating: K+/PG-13 (for anime-style fight scenes/language)

Summary: A restaurant setting brews complications.

A/N: The chapter title and restaurant name both come from a favorite Studio Ghibli song: the opening theme to _Kiki's Delivery Service_ (Message of Rouge). For the scoop on vampire attacks, see _Are You Loathsome Tonight_, and for the background on St. Joe's, _Codename: Moron_.

I appreciate your reviews and thank you for reading this tale!

"I'm positive I've seen you before."

Maya's Tale (7: Message of Rouge)

by

Kenshin

_Dear Diary:_

_That girl-I see her whenever she delivers Father's packages. I see her from my room in the tower. She seems nice enough. Was Mother nice? I imagine I take after Mother, though I never really knew her. One day that girl will come inside, and then we can visit._

_Maybe she will not mind what I am._

0-0-0-0-0

"The girl who's coming." Slipping a hand into her purse (an insouciant leather clutch with a kiss-lock and just enough room for the essentials of lipstick, compact, gun) Shayla Kidd nosed

aside the Beretta. "Fill me in again." She retrieved her compact, dabbed her face.

"I swear you save that for the taxi just to distract me."

Sometimes she thought Hiei got a little too used to seeing her in old clamdiggers, covered in sticky twin handprints, or wearing ragged rehearsal sweats. It was good to remind him that she cleaned up nice.

"Distract?" She ruffled her fringe of hair and was gratified to see that Hiei needed a moment to collect himself.

"And that dress-"

"Oh?" 'That dress' was a little crystal-pleated number in deep burnt sienna with fire-gold lettuce edging. "Is there something wrong with it?"

Flicking a frustrated glance at the cab driver, Hiei switched to English. "Do you want my brain to explode?"

"That depends." As a matter of fact, Hiei wore one of _her_ favorites: navy single-breasted suit, dark and unrelenting, and his old school tie from the St. Joe's poltergeist caper. "You look fine, too. Now as for Maya-"

"I tried to kill Kurama. He cut me up. That girl saw it."

"And?"

"While we were fighting, a _youkai_ grabbed her. We tracked him down and killed him. Kurama gave that girl some pixie dust so she would forget."

"Anything else?"

"She had a thing for Kurama."

"Got it. Don't try to kill Kurama again, would you?"

"I'll do my best," said Hiei. "Now stop worshiping yourself in the mirror and get ready."

She gave him her best Mona Lisa smile. "Who's not ready? She'll be eating out of my hand."

0-0-0-0-0

Kurama looked at Kitajima Maya. She looked at him. Neither said anything.

Then Maya blurted, "This is a very nice restaurant."

Kurama agreed.

Maya hadn't changed all that much since junior high. Her hair was longer. She was still quite lovely.

"Moule En Rouge," she added, "what's the name mean?"

"The Red Mussel, I think."

Maya looked around at the restaurant, all red velvet, candle-light, and widely-spaced tables. "It fits."

Hiei and Shay-san weren't exactly late. But they had allowed Maya and Kurama enough time to develop a truly awkward non-rapport before waltzing in.

_About time,_ thought Kurama.

Once they were seated, Hiei ordered a bottle of champagne from the wine steward, a middle-aged man with a delicately condescending manner. Kurama mentally racked up the bill and cringed. Even splitting half the cost-

In spite of the low lighting, they took stock of one another. Kurama had to admit that Hiei was indeed a good actor. Or maybe it was the suit which made him look legitimate, suave, sophisticated.

When Maya studied Hiei, a delicate pucker creased her brow. "Haven't I met you before?"

Kurama dropped his menu.

"Probably," said Hiei, diving to retrieve the fallen foldover. "Shay-san and I play a number of venues. We even appear in TV ads and the occasional movie."

Maya bit her lip. "No, I don't think that's it."

Kurama broke in. "I hear the, ah, escargot is very good."

"Gaah!" Shayla Kidd's face twisted in disgust. "_Snails!_"

"Oh, I don't know," said Maya. "I'd try snails. I'm pretty adventurous."

"You have them, then." Shayla Kidd studied the menu. "I want something salty and not cooked."

"Beef carpaccio?" suggested Hiei. This was sliced raw Kobe beef, served in a peppered cream sauce.

"The very thing," agreed Shay-san.

"Raw meat?" said Maya. "Well, you beat me there."

The sommelier brought the champagne, nestled in a bucket of ice with a napkin wrapped around its neck. He was good at his job. He opened it without the cork hitting anyone. He poured for Hiei first, then all around.

Taking a cautious sip, Kurama had to admit the champagne was a nice touch.

"So you have an interest in the occult?" began Hiei.

"Oh, yes!" Maya's eyes sparkled. "What about you? Do you watch Ghost Hunters?"

"No," Hiei replied.

"Paranormal Ponderings?"

"No."

"What about Super Mystery Magazine?"

"Can't read."

"He's lying," put in Shay-san.

"You mean Hiei-san reads it?" Maya's blue eyes widened.

"No," she replied. "But I assure you Hiei can read."

"And what about you, Mrs.-?"

"I have twins." Shay-san reached into her purse. "That's more than paranormal enough for me."

There followed an excessive amount of female cooing, and photo-displaying, so that Kurama was relieved when the first course put a stop to it.

They ate in silence, but after a few minutes, Shayla Kidd rose. "Break time," she announced.

Maya got up, too. "I'll go with you."

When they had gone, Kurama took a nervous gulp of champagne. "What does it mean when girls go to the rest room together?"

Hiei momentarily stopped devouring his tuna rolls. "They're talking about me."

"About-"

"About how superior I am compared to you."

"No, seriously."

"Hiei-"

"Ch. Maybe they're battling over who gets me."

"If your ego got any bigger you'd-"

"My money's on Shay-san. Maya may have her in reach and weight, but there's the gun-"

"I liked you better when I was doing all the taunting."

"Listen." Hiei glanced at Shay-san's half-eaten carpaccio. "It's taking just about all I have to suppress my aura. You once said that Kitajima's sixth sense was enhanced in your presence."

"What of it?"

"Yours is circling the drain."

"Speak Japanese, Hiei. For that matter, English. Just as long as you make sense."

"The wine steward."

"What of him?"

"_Youkai._"

Kurama choked on his champagne.

"Don't stare. Part-_youkai_. And my occasional informant."

0-0-0-0-0

The ladies' room was white marble, and apart from a sleepy attendant, Shayla Kidd and the girl were the only ones present.

In the mirror, Shayla kept an eye on Kitajima Maya: pretty, somewhat taller than she, but nowhere near as tall as Kurama. Younger. Kurama's age, 23. Wide cobalt eyes. A deep wealth of mink-brown hair cut shoulder-length, and fair, pinkish coloring.

The girl re-applied a coral shade of lipstick that did nothing to enhance her looks. She was going to need a few lessons. That would be the fun part.

Shayla Kidd refreshed her own lip color-Sugared Bisque by Shiseido-a gold-sparked pink.

Maya was a child compared to her, really. Not that she was yet quite over the hill. And there was something about the girl. It would be a mistake to take her too lightly. _She's cute, but not dumb. This'll be the performance of my life._

Maya blurted, "Are you on a diet?"

_Maybe not so cute._ "No. Should I be?"

"Oh! I didn't mean-!" The girl dropped her lipstick to the counter, fumbled to retrieve it before it rolled onto the floor, and came up pink-faced. "Just... your plate... you left so much on it!"

"Oh, that." Shayla Kidd relaxed. "I'll polish it off later. If Hiei hasn't beaten me to it."

The girl's eyes widened. "Would he really do that?"

"I put nothing past him."

Maya frowned. "I don't think he likes me."

"Hiei? Don't let it bother you. He hates everyone."

"Even you?"

"Especially me."

"Ah, well, actually, I meant Minamino-kun."

Objective: discover any possible threat to Kitajima Maya. Shayla Kidd was a Spellcaster. She could peel info out of the girl in two seconds flat using her powers. There was Command Voice, to be invoked only in case of dire emergency, such as being attacked by vampires.

But there were multiple reasons not to use such a power level. For one, it left her drained, unable to move or speak for crucial moments afterward. For another, she had strict self-imposed rules on whom she might use this power. She knew her own weaknesses, her own headstrong passion for justice, and how far she could be corrupted by power.

And anyway, she liked this girl. "Why do you say that?"

"Minamino's barely spoken two sentences to me since-"

"Oh, is that what's worrying you?"

"Does it show?" Blushing made her even prettier. "Sorry."

"Don't apologize. If our Mr. M. disliked you, why go to all the trouble of finding you?" _Given the fact that I'm the one who actually did the finding._

Maya thought about it for a second. "Maybe he dislikes me now that he's seen me again."

"Impossible. Bet it means just the opposite."

"Really?" Her cheeks flushed again. Maybe pink was her color. "Is that how boys operate?"

"Oh, Sweetie. Is that all? Because how men operate is simple. You feed them. They follow you home."

Maya giggled. "No, it isn't that. But-"

"What then? The Moule En Rouge is an expensive venue, but we'll pick up the tab."

"Will you really? Then why didn't you say?"

"I just want to see Minamino's face when he _reads_ it."

"But isn't that a little-"

"Cruel? Maybe. But we love one another. Practically family. And don't forget I'm an American."

"I suppose that explains the gorgeous dress." Maya plucked at her own outfit. "I mean, look. I can never seem to, well-"

The dress was pretty bad at that. A mud-colored sack that hung almost to the girl's ankles. The only good thing about it was the crisp white collar. "Nonsense. You should see what I look like on a daily basis. As I think you will."

"Can't be as bad as an old green sweatshirt."

"Worse. Give me an afternoon and a handful of yen and you're there."

In the mirror, Maya eyed Shay-san's dress, bag, and the lone gold bangle on her wrist. "But I don't have the knack you do."

"That's just a matter of cut and color."

"Seems way out of my league."

"Doesn't have to be. Now that dress. You belt it up and boom, you're a cute little pilgrim right out of a Hollywood musical."

"You're offering to-would really help me do that?"

"It would be my privilege. One afternoon, and you'll have the knack yourself. And it just so happens I'm free tomorrow."

"One afternoon? Hard to believe, but you're on!"

"This is the result of ten years' worth of costume designers hollering in my ear. Allow me to save you the trouble."

"Awesome. We're going to be good friends, aren't we?"

"Already are."

Maya scrunched at the waist of her dress, as if imagining a belt there. "But... that wasn't really it either. It's just that I'm positive I've seen him before."

"Seen who?" Busy with her hair in the mirror, Shayla Kidd hit just the right note of airy distraction.

"Hiei-san."

_Uh-oh. Maybe that pixie dust of Kurama's has a statute of limitations._ She still managed to hit the right note. "Like Hiei said, you probably have seen him before. He just appeared in a TV ad for a new restaurant featuring Kobe beef."

"Beef?"

"He was happy. They paid him in product."

"No." Maya's frown deepened. "Doesn't ring a bell."

With a single sentence, Shayla could have convinced Maya: _'You saw Hiei on TV, remember?'_

She possessed many other power levels in addition to Command: Suggest, recently deployed on that group of Yakuza-wannabes, and Cajole, neither of which paralyzed or tongue-tied her afterward. She prided herself on never having used it, even once, on either Hiei or the twins.

She said only, "Perhaps you shop the same stores."

"It'll come to me," Maya trilled. "I'm sure of it."

0-0-0-0-0

"Straighten your tie," Hiei said. "They're coming."

"How-"

"Did you take a Kuwabara pill this morning? I'm facing the powder room." Hiei got to his feet. Kurama followed suit.

The girls were seated. Shayla Kidd returned to nibbling her beef carpaccio.

"Hiei almost had his hands on it," Kurama informed her. "But I stopped him."

Hiei drained his glass. "Don't make stuff up about me."

Shay-san glimmered at them both. "You are nothing if not gallant."

The candle-light gathered to draw threads of copper and bronze from Maya's hair. Kurama fumbled for his fork.

He should have insisted on meeting Maya alone. Too bad he wasn't psychic.

Or maybe he was. Kurama could not shake the notion that this girl was in danger.

Shay-san, Hiei, and himself, as Shadow Warriors, had evolved a method of communication that included gestures and offhand remarks, a code of sorts. Just now, Shayla Kidd had given him clues that she had not uncovered any imminent threat, but would pursue the inquiry tomorrow.

The waiter brought their second course, and Maya seemed relieved to talk about the food and the service.

Kurama thought that it was going to be a long night. If only they could make it through dessert.

They did, with everyone intact.

"Oh, look," announced Shay-san. "Here comes the bill."

Kurama turned pale. Inexplicably, Maya giggled.

"See?" Shay-san winked at Maya. "Told you so."

-30-

(To be continued: Shadow warriors often fight peculiar battles.)


	8. Vigilante!

Please read Disclaimer in Chapter One.

Title: Maya's Tale (C8: Vigilante!)

Author: JaganshiKenshin

Genre: Action/Adventure, General

Rating: K+/PG-13 (for anime-style fight scenes/language)

Summary: Hiei and Kurama decide to go it alone.

A/N: The infamous Yojigen Mansion plays a prominent role in YYH's _Chapter Black._ For Hiei's adventure with Kaitou Yuu, please refer to _The Book of Cat With Moon._ Grandma Hirameki appears in _Trade Secret._

"I'm watching you."

Maya's Tale (8: Vigilante!)

by

Kenshin

In his laboratory on the second floor, Von Brandt tried to concentrate, but failed.

For one, there were footsteps coming from the tower room, creaky, hesitant footsteps. She was pacing again.

Throwing down his tools, he glared at the ceiling, as though he could pierce it with eyes alone. But he must master himself, or get nothing done.

With an effort, he tore his attention from the footsteps overhead. Von Brandt picked up his instruments again and continued to hone the camera, refining its capabilities so that it would capture more than mere images of people who had previously passed through a scene.

Once, he reflected, savages had believed that the camera could capture one's soul. But primitives lacked Von Brandt's drive, imagination, and genius.

He would use these qualities, along with his instruments, to augment his own powers through the lens.

But again, his concentration wavered. He was holding a tiny screwdriver no longer than his little finger, and this time, he put it down gently, lest he destroy it.

The image of the twisted Bartholomew tree, and those who had destroyed it, rose again to taunt him.

He took a moment to play out a number of scenarios in his mind. When he was certain he had covered all eventualities, he thought again of the two young men.

They could wait. He would avenge the tree soon enough. This unassuming little camera must first be properly altered, for everything depended on it.

His concentration restored, Von Brandt picked up the screwdriver and went back to work.

0-0-0-0-0

The weather was frigid, and the hour indecently early when Kurama stopped at the Hirameki Studios.

Grandma Hirameki, bullfrog-voiced and brillo-haired, was wearing a cigarette and a flowered muu-muu. She gave Kurama a jaundiced glare. But she condescended let him in, and did not pitch him headlong from a window.

Kurama waited in an alcove that was evidently part coat rack, part storage closet, and listened to a familiar-sounding song play in the background, until Shayla Kidd appeared in sweat-soaked, tattered rehearsal gear, gasping for breath.

She was also wearing pink toe shoes, and a white towel around her neck, with which she liberally blotted her face.

"Am I interrupting?" Kurama asked.

"They're done yelling at me. I think." Shay-san released the towel, but kept in motion, rising up on her toes. An athlete himself, Kurama understood the value of keeping muscles warm, especially in this meat locker of a studio.

"Someone really needs to explain why they hire you because you dance a certain way, then proceed to beat it out of you."

"Couldn't begin to try," said Kurama. "No Hiei?"

She gave a little grimace, half pity, half dread. "He's in a costume fitting."

"Uh-oh."

"Uh-oh is right. Listen. That pixie dust of yours-"

"Dreamflower pollen," Kurama corrected.

"Does it have a shelf life?"

"A what?"

"Because Maya recognizes Hiei. Just not from where."

His brain still fogged from study and sleep deprivation, Kurama struggled with that a while. "About Maya," he said. "Did you find out-"

"Nothing," she said.

"Nothing?"

"Zero, zip, nada. Unless you count clothes and make-up."

"I don't."

"That's the spirit."

"Maya didn't say anything was worrying her?"

"Nope. Just us girls, running from store to store trying on things, driving the people at the make-up counters insane. You know how it goes. Then again, you don't. For which I am infinitely relieved."

Shay-san had done her best. It wasn't her fault this puzzle could not be solved in a day. "Hiei's at a fitting?" Kurama repeated. "He won't be in a good mood."

"I wouldn't plan on poking him with a stick, no."

"Sorry. I ask too much of you."

"I'm the one who's sorry. Still, I enjoyed the afternoon."

"Glad to hear it."

"Not Hiei. Not when he gets the bill."

"You bought Maya _clothes?_"

"No. Just found stores that fit her budget. But I did treat her to some make-up from Shiseido. So you might want to avoid Hiei for, say, ten years."

"Perhaps it's up to me to find out whether Maya-san is actually in danger."

"Don't drug her and tie her up or anything."

"No."

"Look..." Speaking hesitantly, Shay-san gazed down at her pink shoes. "Maybe it's just... you haven't seen Maya-chan since when? Since you were both fourteen? Nearly ten years."

"What are you saying?"

She looked up at him. "Maybe you just miss her."

"That's not it." He said it too fast.

"No. I suppose not."

"Kidd!" Grandma Hirameki's bellow came from the next room. "Get yer ass in here!"

Calling, "Reporting for duty, Ma'am!" Shayla Kidd did not depart from the alcove. "There is one thing."

"Which is?"

"That spooky old mansion of yours-"

"It's not mine. It's just there."

"That Yojigen Mansion."

"What about it?"

"Get the hell back here!" Grandma sounded like she meant it.

"Maya is friendly with a couple of elderly ladies who live on that same block."

"Kidd! Get a move on."

Shay-san did not bat an eye. "Elderly ladies, who, I am quite sure, do not possess Grandma Hirameki's unique charm."

"One can only hope."

"Actually, I kind of like Grandma H."

"Kidd!" Grandma Hirameki came stomping toward the alcove.

"Their name is Kawasaki," Shay-san added.

"I am obliged."

"And Maya-chan's mother died about a year ago."

_That_ was a surprise. "Sorry to hear it."

"To try and contact Mom, Maya-chan sees some kind of fakir or medium who calls himself Muktananda."

"Kidd! Get in here or get canned!"

Sketching Kurama a salute, Shay-san gave a delicate pirouette and danced back to where Grandma Hirameki waited.

0-0-0-0-0

In her little room, Kitajima Maya was having a good time, trying on belts and scarves for Luna-P to admire.

"Minamino's still cute," she informed Luna. "His hair's longer than I remember, but then, so's mine. Wonder if I should tell the girls about meeting him after so many years. Maybe it was a psychic connection! What do you think, Luna?"

But then, of course, the phone rang. And of course, it was Quicksilver, sending her out on a new job.

Grabbing a new rose-pink scarf, Maya tied her hair back and knotted the scarf into a bow. It made her feel just the littlest bit more feminine. Hastily diving into her old green sweats, she ran for the door.

0-0-0-0-0

Shayla Kidd really had done a day's work, and then some. Kurama was already sketching out a plan. He risked phoning Hiei, and said he had something that would cheer him up.

"This better be good," Hiei growled.

"Meet me in the woods at the end of Derelict's Row."

Thirty minutes later, they were seated up in the branches of a white pine tree, enveloped in its sharp, resin scent.

Hiei at his perfect ease in the tree, with knees drawn up, arms around them, face hidden but for the glint of his crimson eyes. Kurama somewhat less at ease, partly due to a persistent branch jabbing the middle of his back. "Maybe next time we'll meet in a cafe," he grumbled.

"At least this is private." With half his face covered, Hiei's words were somewhat muffled.

Kurama could see Hiei was not to be trifled with, but he trifled anyway. "How did the fitting go?"

"The costume's _pink._"

A biting wind plucked Kurama's clothing and chilled his face, helped to blow some of the cobwebs from his mind. He dropped the teasing. "Hiei... why did you choose this location for your training?"

"Why do I do anything? Kaitou."

"Kaitou Yuu? He has that much power over you?"

"Stuff it." Hiei thought a while, then elaborated. "A lot of your arsenal works at a distance. The Rose Whip. Semaneki Grass. Thrashvine. Not mine. Fists, sword-"

"What about the Dragon? Your fire?"

"Not always advisable. And sometimes it's not prudent to fight at close range. I wanted to improve my aim. The big park's getting too crowded. Kaitou was blabbing about this neighborhood only last week."

"I see."

"I hope to hell this isn't what you consider cheering me up, because if it is, I'm going to have to kill you. Just on general principles."

Kurama chuckled. He did not fear Hiei's threat; he knew from long experience it was just Hiei, letting off steam. Probably. "That Agency you work for sometimes-"

"THIS is going to cheer me up?" Hiei's eyes glittered. "Such a pity to cut you down in your prime."

"You wouldn't want Kaa-san to be sad."

"It's the only thing stopping me. Anyway you work for them too. The Agency."

"Only as your consultant. You're the one on their payroll."

"You're not borrowing money from me. Shay-san bought that girl a lipstick. From Shiseido."

"This isn't about lipstick. Or your wallet."

"What then? Because you're running out of cheer-up."

Filling Hiei in on what Shay-san had told him earlier, Kurama concluded, "The Agency. They're not to be brought in."

Hiei's eyes took on a happy gleam. "We're going vigilante?"

"That's one way to put it."

"No paperwork?"

"None."

The huddled knees and arms came down. Hiei stretched, yawned. "Count me in."

"I was thinking that Shay-san could act as Maya-san's guardian. And that I would visit the Kawasaki sisters."

"Leaving me the fake swami," Hiei said. "Sounds like fun."

"I wonder if the 'fake' is working a blackmail angle."

Hiei snorted in disdain. "What would a little girl like Kitajima have for anyone to blackmail her about?"

"I'm counting on you to find out."

Hiei leapt from the tree. "You're right. This did cheer me up." With a backward wave, he departed. Kurama watched him stroll through the woods.

He was in the sisters' neighborhood, true, but he needed time to prepare for the meeting.

Was Shayla Kidd correct? Had he conjured the worried-about-Maya angle merely because after all these years, he wanted to see her again?

Kurama supposed he could be capable of such self-deception. But that recurring dream was real enough: the hazy image of a girl floating, a sense of doom crowding her like miasma. Wondering about it, Kurama got down from the tree.

"I do not take it kindly, little man."

Kurama whirled.

The woods were empty. The deep, threatening voice had come from nowhere.

-30-

(To be continued: While Hiei wades through candles and crystal balls, Kurama negotiates with a pair of sisters.)


	9. By Appointment Only

Please read Disclaimer in Chapter One.

Title: Maya's Tale (C9: By Appointment Only)

Author: JaganshiKenshin

Genre: Action/Adventure, General

Rating: K+/PG-13 (for anime-style fight scenes/language)

Summary: Hiei investigates a lead.

A/N: Any character sketches can be viewed on my blogspot.

_Idiot Beloved_ take place shortly after the Dark Tournament; _Firebird Sweet_ directly follows that timeline and details the origins of Romantic Soldier. As reference, I use a combination of the American YYH manga and the subtitled anime. I appreciate your reviews and thank you for reading this tale!

"For the unbeliever, nothing is possible."

Maya's Tale (9: By Appointment Only)

by

Kenshin

Anything that got Hiei's mind off a costume fitting was good.

The fake psychic's office was in a private home, on a street that looked like the back lot of a tarnished fairy tale: second-tier shops, rooming houses, an air of quiet desperation.

Hiei sat in a greasy spoon cat-corner to the target's house, hiding behind a newspaper he wasn't reading and a coffee he wasn't drinking. He had watched the house for close to an hour, during which time a female (not _that_ girl) had come and stayed about fifteen minutes, then left.

The house was three stories, with a gray shingled front. Anything that was going on inside was hidden by rose-colored velvet curtains faded almost to gray.

Hiei's Firebird, Shayla Kidd, had told him how she used to work fairs and trade shows as a gypsy fortune teller.

("It's simple," she'd say. "People have similar concerns; money, health, love. You do what's known as 'cold reading.' Study a person's age, social status, general appearance. You pick up clues from how they dress and speak and move, and you get better with practice.")

Shay-san's act was pure show-biz, and she'd had a disclaimer right on her table: **For entertainment purposes.**

And still people had believed in her 'psychic powers.'

Hiei went out into the street. The sky was gray, too.

To the left of the building, an alleyway was blocked off by wooden fencing. There was probably a back entrance somewhere.

The front door's glass panels were also draped with faded-rose curtains. A sign was wedged between the curtains and the glass: A half-lidded eye that could have been a crude drawing of his Jagan, and beneath that, a drawing of a crystal ball. Bold black lettering: **Muktananda. By appointment only.**

Hiei didn't have an appointment. He knocked anyway.

Then waited.

Dressed in faded jeans, a blue flannel shirt, and a denim jacket, Hiei also had a watch cap jammed over his trademark hair, in case the psychic had ever heard of Romantic Soldier. He could have been a student. Maybe even pre-med.

If there was anyone approaching the door, the faded curtains blocked off not only sight, but sound.

He knocked again, and a third time.

The doorknob turned. The door creaked open. A voice that sounded like the creaky door whined, "Go away."

Before the door shut again, Hiei muscled his way in.

It was dark, smelling of failure, cloying and sweet, with a bitter undercurrent and a side of stale air.

Successful psychics, fakes though they might be, didn't run their rackets from B-movie back lots. They milked their wealthy clientele from fancy main street parlors with neon signs. Some of them even had radio shows.

Maybe this guy's real racket _was_ blackmail.

It took a few moments for Hiei's eyes to adjust. Thank the heavy drapes for that, and a lack of electric light.

The walls resolved into mud-colored paisley wallpaper. On the floor was patterned carpet also designed to hide dirt. A sideboard with a couple of fat, sandalwood-reeking candles.

On the far wall, an arched doorway curtained off by more faded drapes. In the middle of the room, a round table covered with a fringed paisley cloth. On the table, a crystal ball.

"Can't you read?" whined the psychic. Hiei found himself looking up at a man who was the source of the question, and more than one layer of the smell.

Muktananda was narrow as a broom handle, with skin the color of saddle leather, a hooked beak of a nose, and greased-back hair thick with patchouli.

Hiei was made of tough stuff, but the combination of patchouli, sandalwood and curry had him longing for gray skies.

Muktananda's eyes were so dark they seemed to lack pupil and iris, and they were as hard to read as his age, which could have been anywhere from thirty to fifty.

"My mother," Hiei began, playing it straightforward and subdued. "I think she's trying to reach me."

Muktananda gave a soundless gasp, jerked his glance around, then wrenched it back to Hiei. "By appointment only."

"Can't I make one now?"

"Not without a referral."

"Please." Hiei wasn't about to give out Kitajima's name. "I was wandering and saw your sign. It must be fate." Digging into his jacket, he extracted a handful of crumpled yen notes.

Muktananda's Adam's apple jumped once, twice. His narrow furtive eyes did calculations, and then he tore his starved gaze from the money to study Hiei.

"No," he said at last.

Tempting as the thought might be, Hiei could hardly just slap the information out of Muktananda: _Tell me about Kitajima Maya! Are you blackmailing her?_

"Can't you help me?" Hiei slid a hand into his pocket and rustled more money.

"No." Muktananda was walking him back to the door. "For the unbeliever-no. This is not possible."

And before he could attempt another strategy, Hiei found himself on the wrong side of the door, which clicked shut behind him.

0-0-0-0-0

_Dear Diary:_

_I am a coward. It is entirely my fault that I fled and hid in the tower when Father sent my sisters out one by one._

_He lost them all, while I hid, afraid._

_Father refused to speak for seven days after that. I tried to comfort him, but it was as though I did not exist._

_There is always one failure in any group, and that failure is me. For I am still afraid._

0-0-0-0-0

After he had shoved the punk back into the street and thrown the lock, Muktananda stood with his back to the door, as if his insignificant weight would augment the deadbolt.

_Absurd,_ he thought angrily, _Absurd!_

For someone such as himself, who could read auras, to be stuck in this back-alley dirt trap, conning widows and orphans-

_I am better than this!_

If only he'd had all the right breaks. If only he'd had better connections.

What about Von Brandt? True, the man was cold, dictatorial, off-putting. It was unpleasant to be in his presence. But the bounty he'd given for the girl hadn't stretched far.

The boy did not knock again. Muktananda went upstairs.

Now that boy. Such an alarming aura! Possibly a danger. Did that not warrant further contact with his benefactor?

_Maybe the boy's worth something to Von Brandt. I shall send a message. If I play my cards right, perhaps some day I shall find a wedge to use against the man, and I shall turn on his money spigot. It is beneath me to scrape out a living from these tedious women._

_At least the girl is lively. And pretty. _

_Very. Far too pretty for the likes of Von Brandt._

Muktananda reached the top floor.

He went to a room at the back of the house and slid open a window. Putting two fingers to his lips, he gave a sharp, two-note whistle that could have been mistaken for the cry of a bird.

He did not have long to wait. In answer to his call came a black flurry of wings and claws as a crow flew toward the window.

This was no ordinary crow. In the middle of its head was a cluster of five silver eyes, glittering with malice.

It settled on the window sill, opening its beak to display a sulphur-yellow mouth. In a voice like battery acid, it hissed, "What task, Master?"

"To Von Brandt," ordered Muktananda. "Summon him here."

-30-

(To be continued: Sisters and a stethoscope.)


	10. Sisters

Please read Disclaimer in Prologue/Chapter One.

Title: Maya's Tale (C10: Sisters)

Author: JaganshiKenshin

Genre: Action/Adventure, General

Rating: K+/PG-13 (for anime-style fight scenes/language)

Summary: Kurama pays a visit to the Kawasaki residence.

A/N: Thanks for reading and reviewing!

"Did someone call for a doctor?"

Maya's Tale (10: Sisters)

by

Kenshin

Still rattled by the disembodied voice, Kurama inched through the woods, every sense strained.

The thick stems of trees blocked the long view, preventing him from seeing possible lurkers. The scent of greenery filled his nostrils. His footsteps crackled on dry weeds.

That deep, threatening voice could have been an illusion due to sleep deprivation.

It wasn't a voice Kurama knew. No enemy from his past, certainly not Karasu, who was so thoroughly dead he probably didn't even have a ghost.

What then? An escaped parrot with an extensive vocabulary? An evil ventriloquist, out for laughs?

When a bird exploded from a nearby bush and flew in front of his face, Kurama jumped. His heart labored, and as it slowed to its normal rhythm, he thought of returning home.

Nonsense.

The Kawasaki sisters lived only a couple of blocks away. He straightened, striding quickly now through the woods, and soon reached the sidewalks of Derelict's Row.

As for his sloppy excuse to visit the sisters-

That was Hiei's fault. Naturally.

Hiei had refused to loan Kurama even a single fountain pen, forcing Kurama to use a cast-off stethoscope in his pocket.

Kurama passed a boarded-up rambler and paused. Across the street lay his destination.

The sky was dishwater gray as Kurama approached the well-kept Victorian house with its discreet little nameplate.

It seemed one of the stars of the block, pale sage green, with buttercup yellow trim and deep-sage accents. Long lace curtains hung at the windows. Kurama lifted the brass knocker and rapped once.

They answered the door together: a pair of ladies in their 70s, with startling blue eyes and a quizzical air.

The sisters had the kind of good bones that made for lasting beauty, and looked as though they might have been half-American.

The taller one wore a gray Chanel suit, her silver hair in a French twist. Flicking a keen gaze at Kurama, she fluttered a hand to her chest. "A doctor?" Her voice was soft, pleasant, cultured. "Did someone call for a doctor?"

"Ruth, dear." The shorter one-by half a head-wore a sage-green silk tunic and slacks that had probably cost a fortune. Her salt-and-pepper hair was cut in a 1930s Hollywood bob, and a king's ransom in jade teardrops swung from her ears. "He can't be a doctor. He's a mere child."

"I' not a-" said Kurama defensively, and then laughed, and by that time he had been ushered inside the parlor, and introduced himself as Minamino Shuuichi.

The parlor seemed to be haphazardly furnished, but the varied elements of upholstery and wood and glass worked together in a way that was both comfortable and stylish.

But they had him pegged as a doctor. How-?

"Besides," said Ruth, "We're both healthy as horses."

Olivia put her hand under Kurama's chin. "He may be a child but he's far too handsome for his own good."

"Olivia, do stop. He's turning as red as his hair."

_The stethoscope,_ Kurama realized. _They're not psychic; they saw the tan rubber tubing._

"Doctor in training," Kurama corrected them. "And I had heard you perform evaluations."

"Well, that's true, dear," said Ruth. "But not at home."

"And by appointment only."

"How did you know to find us?"

"It's the lace curtains," said Olivia. "I keep telling you, Ruth, they're like a neon sign."

"Calling all and sundry to our lair," sighed Ruth. "I can see we shall just have to resign ourselves to being used, willy-nilly, by said all and sundry."

"A cruel fate," agreed Olivia, "but we shall try to bear up. Now, the stethoscope, was it?"

They were wonderful.

Kurama was relieved of the stethoscope and seated so quickly that his head spun. Olivia set down a tray offering jasmine tea and chocolate-dipped biscuits.

The elderly sisters moved with the lithe grace of much younger women. Ruth strolled to a tall mahogany shelf and pulled down a volume that looked as though it weighed more than she did. "Medical equipment is far from our area of expertise," she said.

Olivia teased a similar volume from under a coffee table. "Still, it hasn't been restored. This is a hopeful sign."

Ruth paged her tome. "Many people ruin valuable antiquities by means of clumsy restoration attempts-"

"-but this one looks to be from the 1950s." Olivia flipped pages, too, darting glances at the instrument. "Possibly the 1940s. American made, I believe-"

"-sturdy, no brand marking, tubing still in good shape-"

"-only the trumpet's here, might be missing a piece-"

"It may be a _veterinary_ model."

_Trust Smith,_ thought Kurama, _to have a horse stethoscope._

Olivia turned her gaze to Kurama. "Does it work?"

Kurama nodded. The sisters tried it out, first listening to one heart, then trading places, exclaiming in delight. "Well, Olivia," said Ruth, "this settles things once and for all. You do have a heart."

"Its value, I fear, is not great-"

"Your heart, dear?"

"No, this handsome young man's stethoscope."

"-perhaps only a matter of a few yen-"

Kurama coughed discreetly. "An esteemed colleague gave it to me." Dr. Smith had, in fact, flung the stethoscope at him, along with some ancient waiting-room magazines: _'Here, Minamino, ditch these._' "So I wondered, for insurance purposes... ?"

"Dear me, no," said Ruth. "You'd be better off mounting it in a nice shadow box and hanging it on your wall."

Olivia gave him a narrow look. "That's if you have a wall to begin with."

Kurama assured them that he had.

Ruth returned the stethoscope and sat opposite Kurama. Olivia joined them, and the sisters started in on the tea and biscuits. Kurama nibbled a biscuit, to be polite. Then, as the sugar seeped into his bloodstream, he realized that he was starving. He took another biscuit, followed by sips of tea. The comfort of food and tea worked their magic, and he began to feel a bit more like himself.

"Now, dear." Leaning forward to pat Kurama's knee, Olivia's eyes gleamed Ming-Dynasty blue. "Why don't you tell us what _really_ brings you here."

0-0-0-0-0

_Dear Diary,_

_I dare not speak to Father. He doesn't realize that I know. _

_Being the only one with no taste for such things, is it because there is still a part of Mother dwelling within me? But how can there be? I never partook of-_

_Mother must have been a psychic of sorts. It is why she was chosen, of course. And as I am the only sister who did not inherit Father's appetite-_

_I was thinking of something. What was I thinking?_

_Would that Mr. Muktananda be able to tell me? I won't get the chance to ask. I already know my fate._

0-0-0-0-0

"What I'm doing here?" Kurama contrived to appear flustered, and did not need Shayla Kidd's expert stagecraft to sell it. He was flustered for real.

"Yes," said Ruth. "You have that look."

Bewildered, Kurama asked, "What look?"

"The look of an investigator," Olivia concluded.

"I do hope you're not investigating _us._"

Kurama reassured them that he was not.

"Excellent." Ruth darted a glance at Olivia. "Then let's get down to business."

"Fifty years ago," Olivia began, "Spring was afraid to come, too."

Ruth added, "Haven't you noticed how cold it is?"

"A tough young man like you," said Olivia, "wearing what amounts to a winter coat."

"There's a war afoot." Ruth's eyes flashed. "We're well aware of this."

"And we're also well-armed."

"However," continued Ruth, "knives, swords, a beautifully restored English flintlock blunderbuss, a stalwart Browning 12-gauge, and a small Meiji-era cannon-they are all right in their place, but this war cannot be prosecuted with such weapons."

"That camera-" Ruth flicked a frightened glance at Olivia. "What does he do with it?"

"He?" wondered Kurama? _Who...?_

"And why at night?" Olivia went for her teacup again.

"And he never appears but at night." Ruth grabbed a biscuit.

"Perhaps he's a vampire."

"About to be unleashed on all and sundry."

"But if so, why the camera?"

Ruth shivered. "He gives me the chills."

"Unfortunately, we cannot do anything on mere suspicion."

"No, indeed. Imagine what a world that would be."

Olivia shook her head. "We can hardly jail someone-"

"-or barge in unannounced-"

"-or even put a mortal enemy to death-"

"-on feelings only," concluded Ruth.

_No. Even Hiei, for all his talk, would not do such a thing._ Kurama put out a hand, trying to slow the rapid-fire talk. "Mortal enemy?"

"The man with the camera," explained Olivia.

"Who is he?" Kurama asked. "Where does he live?"

"That's the problem," said Ruth. "We really don't know."

"We see him-"

"-but never in daylight."

Kurama felt as though he'd been dropped in a paint-mixer. "Then... how do you know he's a... 'mortal enemy'?"

"How does one ever know?" Ruth shrugged. "You are an investigator, are you not? Though a well-spoken one."

"How did you really come to hear of us?" Olivia leaned forward to pour him another cup of tea. "It's a bit coincidental, when we are so out of the way, and there are many antique dealers downtown."

Kurama stalled, playing with his teacup. Should he tell them of the eerie disembodied voice? Or his fears about Maya? The dream of the floating girl?

Olivia and Ruth appeared to know about the Shadow Wars, if only as a vague idea that something evil was brewing in the world. They had mentioned a spring 'that was afraid to come,' occurring some fifty years ago. They could be a valuable resource, but-

"I wonder." Ruth got a faraway look, then turned to Olivia. "Could it be..."

"They _are_ the same age," agreed Olivia, though Kurama was lost as to what exactly she was agreeing with.

"That dear child Maya," concluded Ruth. "A connection?"

Kurama almost dropped his teacup.

"Maya lost her mother last year-"

"And with her father away three-quarters of the time-"

"-no wonder she was searching."

The sisters grew quiet, but their bright blue gaze spoke: _'Well? The ball's in your court.'_

After Kurama admitted his concerns regarding Maya, Ruth and Olivia apologized.

"But why are you apologizing to me?"

Ruth blushed. "You see, we knew at once who you were."

"Maya has indeed mentioned you."

"But we had to be sure, dear, that you're on the level-"

"-made of the right stuff-" Olivia added.

"-which you have proved, to our satisfaction."

Curiously relieved, Kurama exchanged contact information with the Kawasaki sisters.

"That Muktananda..." Ruth trailed off, exchanging glances with Olivia, who shook her head. Evidently they did not like the idea of Maya's 'psychic' any more than Kurama did.

Once everyone was on the same page, Kurama rose and said farewell. They promised to keep one another posted.

And then he was back out on Rokurokubi Block, Derelict's Row, with the feeling that he had been double-teamed by cloned elderly versions of his mother-and not minding one bit.

0-0-0-0-0

"My dear Muktananda, I am so grateful that you summoned me." Von Brandt sat back in a rather dirty armchair and waved away the offer of a suspicious-smelling hookah.

It was night.

Their shadows leapt in the flicker of two fat candles. Muktananda sat opposite Von Brandt, the table with its crystal ball between them, as though he was about to conduct a seance.

"He could hide his look but he couldn't hide his aura." Muktananda licked his lips nervously. "I don't know who he is, but I do know _what_ he is, and you told me to-"

"Alert me. Quite right, dear fellow, quite right. We must be ever-vigilant against these... creatures."

As a psychic, Muktananda was a failure. He was good at cold-reading women, vulnerable women, and divesting them of money in exchange for the chance to speak with a departed loved one, who was just going to materialize, any moment.

But Muktananda was gifted in one aspect. He could tell whether a person was human, or-otherwise.

Most of the time, that is.

Muktananda gave a little jerk of his bony shoulders. He looked like a deer, poised on the edge of flight.

Reaching into his coat, Von Brandt retrieved a number of crisp new bills and put them on the table. "Strictly as a show of gratitude, you understand."

Muktananda's eyes widened at the sight of the money. His grasping fingers fumbled for the bills.

"Do count it, there's a good fellow."

While Muktananda bent his head to the task, Von Brandt rose, and, very gently and discreetly, slipped out an unassuming little 35-mm camera, and snapped the psychic's picture.

"Smile," he said.

For all that he seemed made of wire and rawhide, Muktananda slumped to the floor like a garden slug.

Von Brandt stopped to press a fingertip to the psychic's neck. No pulse. The flesh already cold. "You might have tried to run when you had the chance. Not that it would have done you any good."

He now knew the camera worked as he had intended. It only needed one minor adjustment. "You've performed an invaluable service, my good fellow."

It might amuse him, Von Brandt thought, to transfer Muktananda's soul from the camera, to, oh, say a cat. But he had no time to linger. He opened the back of the camera, extracted the roll of film, and crushed it in his red-gloved hand.

Careful to leave no evidence, Von Brandt pushed the ruined film into his pocket, then got out a piece of yellow card with black writing. He went to the door and removed the card that had been there, substituting his own, which read:

_On vacation. Back shortly._

Then he returned to the heap of flesh and clothing, and again stooped, this time pulling his money from the dead fingers.

He put the money back in his coat, alongside the film.

Muktananda had outlived his usefulness, but he had performed one last bit of service. He had described his visitor.

This was the black-haired destroyer of the beautifully twisted Bartholomew tree. And he had been alone. The red-haired one was no doubt now on his way to a nervous breakdown.

Von Brandt's primary goal was an improved new breed. His creations would be neither youkai nor human, but with attributes of both. And that must come first. He would eliminate the pair of tree-choppers after he had secured the girl.

But he was getting ahead of himself. Here, in Muktananda's house, Von Brandt faced one more task.

It was not a particularly pleasant task, but it must be accomplished, and it required some thought before digging in.

He could not leave the dead man lying here. Muktananda would be found sooner or later, by a client wondering where the psychic had gone, or a neighbor calling the police about the stench of rotting flesh.

Although Von Brandt could not be destroyed by normal means, he had no desire to attract undue attention.

The very thought of what he had to do was distasteful. He could not disguise it with forced good cheer. For one, there was the filth of the surroundings.

For another, there was only the light from those horrid scented candles. No white linen, no fine wine, no music, no crystal goblets, no silver fork or knife.

Glancing at the deceased psychic, Von Brandt shuddered.

He was not used to such crude fare, and was certain it would cause him indigestion.

Although he comforted himself with visions of the goal, the girl, the prize, Von Brandt had to steel himself before hefting the body onto the table once used for bilking customers, and disposing of the evidence in the only way possible.

-30-

(To be continued: Where is Maya?)


	11. Break-In

Please read Disclaimer in Chapter One.

Title: Maya's Tale (C11: Break-In)

Author: JaganshiKenshin

Genre: Action/Adventure, General

Rating: K+/PG-13 (for anime-style fight scenes/language)

Summary: Hiei goes back to the psychic and finds some strange details.

A/N: _Idiot Beloved_ takes place shortly after the Dark Tournament; _Firebird Sweet_ directly follows that timeline. In order for certain character development to make sense, you might read those fics in order.

On the roof, a man can watch unseen.

Maya's Tale (11:Break-In)

by

Kenshin

Suspended in mid-air was a girl, her body so still one could not determine whether she was alive or dead. All around her whirled an assortment of cards, in a paper merry-go-round.

The image of the girl was blurred and hazy, like a badly-exposed movie filmed through fog.

Kurama shot bolt-upright, flinging away blankets. He was bathed in sweat, and his heart slammed painfully against his ribs. For a few moments, he did not know where he was, and then he did.

Oh. That dream. Always the same.

Dragging a sleeve across his face, he glanced at the bedside clock. Fluorescent green numbers informed him that it was 4 AM.

No point trying to get back to sleep.

He snapped on the lamp, then reached for the chemistry text on the night table. With the book balanced against his knees, Kurama leafed through page after page, neither seeing nor comprehending the words and symbols.

Chemistry. A branch of science, but also a saying, a term, for an attraction between two people. Did he and Maya have such an affinity?

Over the years, Kurama had thought of Maya now and then, but middle school was long ago and far away. He wasn't sure of much right now. He could not even be certain that the girl in his recurring dream _was_ Maya.

He put the book down, got out of bed, and began to dress.

0-0-0-0-0

Standing side-by-side in Grandma Hirameki's studio, Hiei and Shay-san strove to warm up in meat-locker temperatures.

It was a wonder that Hiei's thoughts alone didn't scorch the floorboards and melt the floor-to-ceiling mirror behind the practice barre.

_Broken laptop: bad enough._

_Haunted Palace by Zo, droning in the background: worse._

_Grandma Hirameki glaring at my back: obnoxious._

_Failure at the hands of Muktananda: no words._

As if reading his mind, Shayla Kidd murmured, "At least you're not wearing that pink prince get-up."

Grandma Hirameki's scowl twisted into a grimace, and through the blue haze of cigarette smoke that passed for air, Hiei said, "He made me."

In mid-plie, Shay-san's expression was pure bafflement. "Who _what_ you?"

"You heard." Though he spoke English, Hiei kept his voice low. "Don't know how, but the fake psychic 'made' me." His breath misted the mirror. He never paid much attention to temperature, but Shayla Kidd was human, and felt the cold.

She was wearing not only ballet tights, but thick leg warmers, a long woolen scarf, a sweatshirt, a zippered, hooded jacket, and a woolen cap that hid her marigold-bright hair. With each step toward properly warmed muscles, she would remove another layer of clothing.

Shedding her zippered jacket and flinging it in the corner on top of her overcoat, she said, "Maybe he's not such a fake."

"Operating from that back-alley joint?"

Grandma Hirameki lit another cigarette and stuck it in her face. She watched them, arms akimbo, suspicion glittering in her pale, pouchy eyes.

"Is it just possible," whispered Shay-san, "that slapping him around might have had something to do with-"

"Except I didn't. Not that I wasn't tempted."

"He read the desires of your heart?" Coming up from another plie, she unwound the scarf and billowed it toward her growing pile of outerwear.

"I was in disguise, too."

"Oh, you poor thing."

"I don't give a rat's ass what language you're babbling in." Grandma's cigarette bobbed. "Just as long as you both shut up!"

They complied, but Hiei slid a glance at Shayla Kidd, and she wouldn't have to be psychic to know he was thinking, _Damn if I lose this fight._

0-0-0-0-0

_Dear Diary:_

_I am weary-certain that my efforts have failed. _

_Oh, to feel the sun on my face. But Father will not let me leave the house until after dark._

_With Father so pre-occupied, I might risk opening the window and putting my head out for a breath of air, but I am so forgetful these days, and my window sticks. Father might hear it open. I am already treading on thin ice._

_The time approaches when I will have to make the decision of my life. But I am too much the coward to make it._

0-0-0-0-0

There was a woman crossing the street, heading toward Muktandana's place.

_Why,_ Hiei wondered, _am I always getting dragged into other people's business? This has nothing to do with me._ But if he was being candid, he knew it did have to do with him. _That girl was there when I first ran into Kurama. She saw us fight. Kurama thinks she's in trouble now, and he's always had my back._

_So I've got his._

It was mid-afternoon, and Hiei had escaped Grandma Hirameki for the moment. His perch on the roof gave him a good view of the street, and an excellent look at the approaching woman.

Middle-aged, slim, and quietly well-dressed, she glanced right and left, as if fearing witnesses, reached the psychic's door, and knocked.

The pitched roof posed no problems for Hiei. His camouflage, right down to thin leather gloves, matched the roof's olive-drab color. He was confident of remaining unseen.

The woman knocked again. Then a third time. Finally she left, as furtively as she'd come.

Hiei waited a few minutes before crossing the roof to the back of the house. With a series of acrobatic moves, he lowered himself to a third-story window.

_I've had it with this cloak and dagger stuff. Give me a nice street brawl any day._

The slider window opened readily enough, but was blocked on the inside with those same heavy curtains, well-faded by the sun.

_Face it, though. You're good at it. You found Mr. Groovy, even if no one else knows you did._

Once inside, Hiei listened through the curtains. He heard nothing, no snoring, no radio, no footsteps.

The scent of sandalwood and patchouli was a mere hint beneath the smell of dust. Apart from a faint whiff of curry, there was another smell in the background.

He parted the curtains, planning to leave the way he'd entered, and stripped off his leather gloves. Under those, Hiei wore a second pair: latex surgical gloves, thin, flexible, and print-proof.

The bedroom, not surprisingly, had dark and dingy brown floral wallpaper. The bed was unmade. It looked as if that was its natural state.

Hiei opened the closet. On the top shelf was an old hard-sided suitcase of brown leather. There were shirts and pants hanging from racks. A couple of neckties, a tan sports jacket.

If Muktananda had a family, they didn't live here.

Out of the bedroom, across the hall. Two doors. The first was open. A bathroom that was just a bathroom. No bodies in the tub. No room for a vanity. On the sink was a toothbrush and a shaving mug and a safety razor.

On to the second door. Hiei opened it. This was an office, containing a file cabinet, bookshelves, and a desk. Client records? Might be something there about that girl, but-when tossing the house of a phony psychic in broad daylight, be quick.

He checked the file cabinet and desk. Locked.

Given time, Hiei might defeat the locks. But any tampering could lead back to him, gloves or not.

Biting back his frustration, Hiei moved on.

Nothing much had been spent on creature comforts, apart from those heavy faded curtains on every window. Must have been Bargain Day at the Rose Velvet Curtain Emporium.

A stairwell hugged the right-hand side of the house. The second floor contained a nearly-empty storage room. There were only a couple of worn wicker chairs. The curry-smelling kitchen was on this floor, too.

Dishes in the sink, rinsed but not washed. Nothing to see here, move along. Hiei descended to the first floor.

Here, too, there were only two doors in the hall. One was at the back of the house, and probably gave onto a yard. The other was a narrow sliding door on the left, and when Hiei opened it, he found himself in a tiny room no larger than a closet.

He spotted a familiar archway on the opposite wall, blocked off by more curtains.

This claustrophobic space was illuminated by a single bare bulb in the ceiling, and was paneled in thick soundproofing tiles, like the ones they had in recording studios, or expensive restaurants.

It also contained a chair in front of a rack filled with electronic equipment. No doubt this was used for generating 'voices from beyond' to trick customers into believing they were speaking with a dear departed, or maybe just a departed.

Crossing to the archway, Hiei eased the curtains aside.

The parlor was a room that would always be dark, and now with no candles burning, it was even dimmer than before. Hiei almost had to rely on memory to see the paisley-printed wallpaper, the sideboard, and the table with its crystal ball.

That was when the background scent rose, and he could no longer put it out of his mind.

Hiei was all too familiar with it: the metallic smell of blood. Yet there were no visible bloodstains. You could search the busy carpet for a year and not find any.

That girl had surely been in this room. But when? And where was she now?

His first fleeting thought was that the psychic had slaughtered Maya, then fled in panic. But then his intellect took over. Why kill a regular, paying customer?

There was no sign of a struggle. Or if there had been a fight, someone had taken the time to set everything right again. That was not the act of a panicked accidental killer, but of someone with pre-meditated motives.

Who? And whose blood was in the air?

Maybe Muktananda had cut himself shaving. But people shave in the bathroom, not the parlor. Maybe he had cut himself in the kitchen. It happened. However, the smell of blood had not emanated from the kitchen, but from here.

Hiei couldn't discern if the blood-smell was human. Maybe the fake sacrificed goats. Maybe some of his clients liked that sort of thing.

Hiei returned to the alcove to have another look at its electronic equipment.

He recognized some of it from his days as a member of Romantic Soldier. A black box about the size of an attache case, with both sliding and dial-type controls: an analog audio mixer. There was also a Moog synthesizer, a sort of electronic keyboard that could be used to generate sounds.

And a microphone, and a reel-to-reel tape recorder.

Maybe Muktananda was in the habit of recording client sessions. Hiei looked quickly for tapes and found none. No; if Muktananda made any, they'd be locked away, up in the office.

With the irritating thought that he knew less now than he had before, Hiei entered the parlor again. Slipping a hand inside the curtains that cloaked the front door, he reached for the sign in the window.

He got it out and turned it over. It was a different sign.

No crude drawing of a half-lidded eye, nor of a crystal ball. No black block letters on a white card reading _Muktananda: By appointment only,_ but an elegant cursive writing on pale yellow stock.

The new sign read: _On vacation. Back shortly._

Right. The mystic was going on vacation. Forgetting a well-dressed client who probably had a standing appointment. With his clothes and suitcase still in the closet.

-30-

(To be continued: the trap has been set, and someone is about to walk in.)


	12. Trap

Please read Disclaimer in Prologue/Chapter One.

Title: Maya's Tale (C12: Trap)

Author: JaganshiKenshin

Genre: Action/Adventure, General

Rating: K+/PG-13 (for anime-style fight scenes/language)

Summary: Von Brandt is about to get his wish.

A/N: For reference, I use a combination of the American YYH manga and the subtitled anime.

"Mother? She's here?"

Maya's Tale (12: Trap)

by

Kenshin

_Haunted Palace, Haunted Palace_

_The Prince in pink, Princess in black_

_Haunted Palace, All is lost_

The bedroom was dark as pitch. Four in the morning, Hiei reckoned, was far too early to be awakened by the imaginary droning voice of Zo.

Droopy little fop of a boy, droopy little fop of a hit.

_Damn song._

With _Haunted Palace_ still boring into his brain, Hiei slunk to the bathroom. Disdaining to turn on a light, he splashed cold water on his face and dragged on some sweats.

He was surprised to find his Firebird down in the kitchen, staring at the black screen of the broken laptop by the light of a votive candle at her elbow.

Wrapped in a robe two sizes too big, her gray eyes puffy with sleep, hair tousled to a marigold halo, Shayla Kidd looked like an angel who'd stayed up way past her bed-time.

"Hush," she murmured, a line of concentration stitched between her brows. "I'm pretending."

"Won't do you any good." He gently closed the cover of the laptop. "Damn song."

"You, too?" She yawned. "Did you see those set designs?"

He nodded. "Expensive. Complicated."

"A crumbling ruin in stone and mortar," she agreed, "dangerous for us poor performers."

"I won't let anything happen to you." There was a pot of drip coffee ready on the counter. Hiei fumbled for the carafe, poured some into a mug and then down his throat.

She held out her own mug for a refill. "Where are you headed?"

"To go make Kurama's life miserable."

She yawned again. "At least you're not wearing pink."

0-0-0-0-0

The dream always woke him in the middle of the night, and he could never get back to sleep.

The house felt oppressive in its silence.

Kurama had stared out his window for what seemed hours, watching the sky fade from black to slate to steel. The day promised frigid temperatures. A weather report predicted snow flurries.

As a master of plants, Kurama knew any number of remedies with which he could dose himself to sleep. He didn't like doing it. He preferred a clear head. But a few more days of this and a drug hangover wouldn't matter, because he'd be dead of sleep deprivation.

Six of one, half-dozen of the other.

He found himself thinking of the Suntory he'd given Hiei a week ago, half-wishing it was still on his night table.

Well. He could wrestle with chemistry some more, or he could get dressed and get on with it.

Just as Kurama was leaving the house, Hiei stopped him.

Hiei looked as bad as Kurama felt: bleary-eyed, unshaven, rumpled, a man you wouldn't want to get into an elevator with.

The sky had turned white, as predicted, about to spew snow. At this early hour, they were alone.

"What is it, Hiei? I'm on my way to the library." Kurama's research into 'fifty years ago' had gone nowhere. The public library contained no reference to anything unusual that occurred on Rokurokubi Block back then.

As charming as they were, the Kawasaki sisters were elderly. Their memory could well be faulty.

Kurama planned a visit to the Fukuzumi Oh private library before classes. If he came up empty again, that was it.

With a glance around to ensure privacy, Hiei gave a terse report of his two visits to Muktananda, ending with the discovery of an 'on-vacation' sign.

"Gone," sighed Kurama. "Well. Can't be helped." He turned to leave. But suddenly Hiei was in front of him, gripping his arm, scorn glittering in his crimson eyes.

"What the hell happened to you, Kurama?"

Kurama gazed over Hiei's head. Far down the block, someone else was coming out of a house, walking away from them. "Can't imagine what you're referring to."

"I consider myself one tough bastard, but you-you used to be _scary._"

Kurama yanked his arm free.

He was worn. He was frustrated. Though he tried to quell his reaction, anger bubbled up like scorching lava.

"Maybe it's you," he snarled, then ground his teeth together to stop the lava-flow.

_What's happening to me? What's wrong?_ This was not like him. Kurama was the cool-headed one, the controlled one, and he could not chalk up this reaction to mere lack of sleep.

Jamming both hands in his pockets, he struggled to tame his wildcat emotions. He managed to wrap them in chains-just.

"Maybe it's all of you. These-connections." Kurama glanced back at the house, where his mother was no doubt still sleeping. "Tying me down. Draining me."

Hiei was quite unruffled. "Pitiful excuse. They give you strength. Urameshi found that out."

Kurama's hands were twitching. "Is that all?"

"Yeah." Hiei shrugged. "You've got your chem exam tomorrow, I've got to crawl back into the rehearsal studio. Guess that Kitajima girl's on her own."

Kurama wanted to rip both twitching hands from his pockets, wind them around Hiei's neck, and squeeze until he shut up.

Another early pedestrian ambled toward them. The sky released a handful of snowflakes. And before he lost control altogether, Kurama turned his back on Hiei and strode away.

0-0-0-0-0

_This,_ Kitajima Maya promised herself, _is the last time I deliver a package here. Ever._

But she knew Mr. Quicksilver would send her again. Mr. Von Brandt was a regular.

Poor Daddy had touched down yesterday, heavy with jet lag, and had gone again this morning. Who knew when he would return? A week, three? Must be hard on him. Daddy had left her a hastily scrawled note, and a wrapped present. Maya looked forward to opening it when she got back home.

She couldn't get warm, and it wasn't just that the clouds blocked the afternoon sun and the white sky gave no cheer.

It was snowing. In April. Did that count as a supernatural event?

Because of work, she had missed the Adventure Club, and was beginning to envy Riku, Chikako, Ayumi, or anyone who had regular hours and could count on attending meetings.

And that Mrs. Shayla. It would be nice to see her again, too. But how, given their crazy schedules?

This time, Maya wore a pale lilac scarf in her hair, a color that went surprisingly well with the forest-green of her old sweats, which she now wished was an overcoat.

Chips of snow danced sidewise, as if struggling to keep warm despite the bitter wind.

Standing on the porch of the Von Brandt residence, Maya, too, danced. Partly to keep warm, like the companionable snowflakes, but also partly from impatience. She wanted to ditch the package and get to the Kawasaki's house for tea.

It was always so warm there. And the sisters were so kind. Sometimes, quite apart from the usual delivery of photographs for evaluation, Miss Olivia and Miss Ruth ordered elaborate, wonderful cakes, just so Maya could deliver and help eat them.

She rang again.

It didn't do for a mere courier to question the nature of her deliveries, but Maya's natural curiosity made her speculate.

Mr. Von B. was very old-world, and the packages were always from photo developing shops around town. Was he a spy? Not at all supernatural, but potentially thrilling nevertheless.

At last, Mr. Von Brandt answered the door. He was wearing his perennial overcoat with its fur collar, and the sight made her feel even colder.

He was tall, taller than Minamino, and wide. His hair was thick and dark as a bear's pelt, but touched with gray at the temples. A neat little goatee sat beneath a meaty prow of a nose, and startling red lips.

Mr. Von Brandt made her a little uneasy, maybe because those watchful, icy eyes pouched in pale flesh seemed at odds with his comical, caterpillar eyebrows.

He seemed to belong in another world. A remote, mountainous, European world.

Or maybe she was just romanticizing.

Of course, the guy was spooky in the best of times. She always felt as if he _wanted_ something of her, something beyond the expected package.

"Ah!" His deep, hollow voice rang with a slight accent. "There you are. You seek Muktananda? Did the sign not tell you to come here? How negligent of the man."

"Mr. Muktananda?" Her eyes widened. "You know him?" Mr. V. B. did not reply. "I had an appointment earlier, but the sign said he went on vacation. It didn't say where."

"But the one whom you seek." The caterpillar brows crawled together. "The one you have sought all along. You will find her here. I am positive Muktananda told you."

"Here? My _mother?"_ A wild excitement grew in Maya. "Mr. Muktananda reached her?" She tried to peer past Mr. V. B.'s shoulder, but his big frame blocked her view. She got a fleeting impression of pale walls, pale shiny floors, glittery lights.

Mr. Von B. shook his head. "I am surprised and disappointed that you were not told."

"Told what?" Maya jiggled up and down to keep warm.

He reached out a red-gloved hand.

Every week Mr. M. had stared into the crystal ball and cocked his head, had lit incense and consulted the spirits and laid out cards, but all he could tell her were snatches of words that, no matter how Maya struggled, never made sense.

"Perhaps I misunderstood," said Mr. Von Brandt. "I had thought you wanted to see your mother."

"I did!" Maya burst out. "I mean, I do! You don't mean she's here, do you? As in actually, in-the-flesh here? Where is Mr. Muktananda?" She craned her neck, but Mr. Von Brandt's solid form continued to block her view.

Some flash of emotion shuttered his eyes. "Very well. I was mistaken. If you will just give me the package."

"Oh! The package, right."

Maya meant to hand it over. She really did. But she heard something from far back in the house.

A voice. Calling. A female voice.

Could it be true?

Maya's little black Zuma was parked in the street. The Kawasaki sisters lived down the block, but with Zuma as transportation, she might check things out and still arrive right on time.

Mr. Von Brandt's house was certainly big enough to contain a spiritualist's room. There was no smell of incense, but then the cold made it difficult to smell anything.

"_Is_ it my mother?" She turned her gaze up to Mr. Von B's. "Can she really speak to me?"

Mr. Von B. oozed disdain. "I thought you had decided against seeing her. Can you not make up your mind?"

He glared down at Maya, as though she were a particularly backward member of his serving staff, and he had given her every chance to improve herself, at which she had failed miserably, and he was about to send her packing.

No. She was no serving girl, and no coward. Besides, what would the Adventure Girls say? _'You got a chance to snoop around in a foreign spy's house and you said NO?'_

Slowly, the door closed in Maya's face.

"No, wait!" Maya sprang forward. The door opened again, just as slowly, and Mr. Von Brandt looked down at her, with an ill-concealed air of impatience.

"I do want to see her," Maya declared.

"Then by all means." With a sweeping, Continental gesture he stood aside and let her walk over the threshold.

The walls were pale silk, trembling in the glittery light of wall sconces. The floor was real marble, like a fairy-tale palace. But the temperature was just as cold inside as out.

Maya had little time to admire the decor. Standing at the end of the hallway was a girl, wearing a heavy dress that was exactly the deep forest color of Maya's sweats.

Intrigued, Maya looked her over.

The girl was hardly old enough to be Maya's mother, for she appeared to be about Maya's own age, 23.

Green Girl looked awfully solid to be a ghost.

She was not homely so much as plain and well-scrubbed. Her face was round, and her nose, short, upturned, almost a pug nose. Her mouth was wide, and her eyes had just the hint of an upward slant at the outer corners, framed by solid straight brows that had never known the touch of a tweezer.

Her skin was almost as pale as the marble floors, and her straight, light-brown hair was scraped tight into a bun. The heavy woolen dress did not suit her at all.

_Been there, done that,_ thought Maya.

Maya could just imagine Shayla Kidd's voice, and see the lift of her sleek eyebrows and know beyond a doubt that she would say to this girl, not unkindly: _"Sweetie, I don't care if that dress is made of the finest wool gabardine direct from Paris. The cut and color are all wrong. And why not try a touch of lipstick?"_

And then maybe they could all go shopping, Maya and Shay-san and the ghost. That might be nice.

_If can hear Shay-san's voice, why can't I hear Mother's? _

Maybe Miss Ruth and Miss Olivia were right. If Mother wanted to speak to Maya, she would do it herself.

With that thought, a many-legged chill skittered down Maya's back, a scorpion made of ice.

She still had a death grip on Mr. Von Brandt's package. The unpleasant feeling persisted, pressed in. Her ribs ached from the effort to draw air.

Mr. Muktananda was not here. She was certain of it now.

_But hold it a sec. Stop being such a coward._ Sure, okay, this girl was not Mother. But what if this was a medium? Another, better medium than Mr. M.? In her avid research, Maya had read that spirits were sometimes a little picky about speaking through a member of the opposite sex. "Mother?" she said tentatively.

Green Girl smiled. "Mother," she echoed. Her voice was light, fragile, far more ghostly than the girl herself.

_Maybe she's channeling Mother._

Green Girl repeated, "Mother."

"Must you stand there yammering like a parrot?" Mr. Von B. snapped. Maya gave a little start. She had just about forgotten he was there. She flicked him a glance, no more.

But Mr. Von Brandt looked absolutely _furious._ Fit to be tied. "Prepare to assist!" he barked.

Maya began to edge toward the door. _Assist? Assist what?_

"But Mother," Green Girl insisted. "My new mother. I want to get to know my new mother."

_She wants WHAT?_

"Then be quick about it!"

And the girl's face, now alight with eager curiosity, zoomed forward to examine Maya.

While her body remained standing down the hall.

_At last,_ thought Maya, _a supernatural event._

But she was not intrigued. She was scared. Flat-out scared. Her brave words to Luna-P seemed a mockery now: "I'd show those aliens a thing or two!"

Maya had always believed she would be ready. Because of her studies. Because of her interest. That she would treat any encounter with dauntless, ready courage.

But now that it was real, she felt more like a deer caught in the headlights.

Her nerveless fingers opened. She dropped her package. Someone bent to scoop it from the floor. Maya caught the movement from the corner of her eye.

Like a creature out of a bad monster movie, Green Girl stretched out her serpentine neck, so that her head was the only part that approached.

The long thin neck twisted this way and that as the girl studied Maya from all angles, and Maya knew for a certainty that this was not her mother, that this creature was not even human, that Mr. Muktananda had never been here, that this had been a trap, and an old memory stirred in her, struggling to rise, from back in middle school, and this time the memory burst to the surface in shocking, crystal clarity.

She heard Minamino's voice echo across the years, husky and urgent:

**"Run!"**

But Maya stood frozen, as though bolted to the floor, and then she felt the sudden sharp sting of a needle pierce her neck.

-30-

(To be continued: The nightmare has only just begun.)


	13. Vault

Please read Disclaimer in Chapter One.

Title: Maya's Tale (C13: Vault)

Author: JaganshiKenshin

Genre: Action/Adventure, General

Rating: K+/PG-13 (for anime-style fight scenes/language)

Summary: With Maya missing, Olivia and Ruth decide it is high time to open the vault.

A/N: _Idiot Beloved_ takes place shortly after the Dark Tournament; _Firebird Sweet_ directly follows that timeline. For reference, I use a combination of the American YYH manga and the subtitled anime. I appreciate your reviews; thanks for reading!

"Were we selfish? Or just afraid?"

Maya's Tale (13: Vault)

by

Kenshin

Olivia could pretend no longer.

Dressed as for a tea party, Olivia wore a gray Chanel suit that highlighted her salt-and-pepper bob. Ruth was in a storm-blue shantung silk dress that made her hair glow like polished silver. Checking her watch, Olivia gave Ruth a worried glance and saw that Ruth, too, was concerned.

"I feel such a nervous old biddy," Ruth said, wringing her hands, "and that won't do."

Maya had been expected for a late afternoon tea, and it was already dark outside.

"She did have an appointment with that mystic of hers, and then a local delivery," said Olivia.

"But it's not like Maya to leave us hanging."

"She could have gotten a call for another job on the fly," Olivia said reassuringly, but she was a little worried herself.

Ruth stood at the front window, parting the lace curtains. "There was no answer at her home, or her mobile."

Olivia went to the mantlepiece, first gazing at the fire, then at the Sevres vase. "But phones do get turned off, for one reason or another."

The Old Paris Green Sevres vase had arrived yesterday, and as there _were_ no seasonal flowers to speak of, Ruth had arranged in it a pink sprig of artificial sweet pea. Unsatisfactory, but it would have to do.

The snow had stopped, leaving no trace, but it was, if possible, even colder. The warmth of the house made Olivia reluctant to venture outside, and she thought it would do little good to prowl the street anyway.

This house was a rarity in that it had been custom-built with insulation and central heating, back when this was one of the wealthiest neighborhoods around. Nevertheless they had laid on the fire, but the brave crackling of the cedar logs and the smoky scent did little to dispel Olivia's nerves.

"Silly, fussy, old biddy," Ruth insisted.

"This isn't like Maya at all," Olivia murmured.

"Poor thing, no mother, father away on business nine-tenths of the year, and that job of hers, all odd hours."

"She seems to handle it well enough."

"Could we use an assistant here, do you think?"

"Would she go for it?"

"She's not here to ask," said Ruth, still at the curtains.

The flames went on eating the logs, and Olivia's nerves kept eating at her. It was too warm. She left the fireplace and went to the sofa. "Ruth," she said, "I do believe it's time."

"Time?" Ruth let the curtains fall back to cover the window. "Do you mean-"

"The Vault." Olivia nodded. "It does seem peculiar that we two, who are so interested in history-"

"-should have avoided this subject for so long."

"As though we were afraid."

Ruth crossed to the sofa and sat next to Olivia, but her eyes were on the front window. "That man with his camera. The girl we saw trailing after him once or twice. The sight of them fills me with dread that some awful event is about to occur."

Olivia agreed. "As we told that young man. But there's more to it. Something is taking place around us, some danger half-glimpsed. These fifty years have passed in a dream of safety, an illusion that-"

"-is about to burst," said Ruth.

Her stomach a-flutter, Olivia replied, "Then we'd better get up there."

0-0-0-0-0

With the mother of his new race unconscious, Von Brandt carried her limp little body across the threshold of The Room, and laid her down on a cold steel table.

He disliked her casual garb, the dark ugly sweat shirt and the dungarees. Clothing that could have been worn by a boy.

Could he not spare time to change her clothes? Where was that blasted girl anyway? This sort of thing really was her job.

The mother-to-be was beautiful, but her raiment should be beautiful as well. She looked down at him, from every angle, every nook, every curve in the room, smiling sometimes, dreamy sometimes, sometimes in fierce concentration.

Von Brandt paused for a moment, looking all around, savoring her beauty.

Over on a chair, a gown had been laid, eggshell-pale, a lovely thing of lace and satin.

He had nothing to fear after all. His camera, his protection, his escape clause, was now perfected, and secreted at the ready. His other instruments, the gleaming test tubes, the scalpels, the needles, were also poised at the ready.

He would change the girl himself. And then, eager to see the sort of offspring that would result from this union, Von Brandt would begin the process of combining his genetic material with hers.

0-0-0-0-0

'The Vault,' as Olivia and Ruth referred to it, was in the upstairs office where Mother and Father Kawasaki had managed their business affairs.

The cozy little room had a curtained window facing the street. The gold-striped burgundy walls were busy with small paintings from Mother and Father's personal collection; nothing too valuable, but paintings they had liked: mostly landscapes in oil, but one or two historical scrolls, even a watercolor swan.

There was a smell of gun oil where the trusty Browning shotgun hung on a rack with an American Civil War sword and the English blunderbuss.

The mahogany desk, its fancy beadwork trimmed with well-worn gold leaf, was angled to hide a worn spot in the rug, and the old ladderback chair was stiff and uncomfortable, but they had never changed it out.

"I always feel like a safecracker." Ruth eased behind the desk to a landscape that hung on the wall. She touched a button hidden by the frame, and the painting slid aside, revealing a small safe. She dialed the combination.

The Vault was where Ruth and Olivia kept essential records, stock certificates, a small amount of gold boullion, three or four pieces of valuable jewelry, and The Letter.

Ruth reached for the letter, but she jerked her hand back. "Oh, I can't! I'm so foolish. Olivia, dear, could you...?"

The letter was from Mother, inside a parchment envelope that had been sealed with red wax. "I'll try." Sitting in the stiff uncomfortable chair, Olivia took the letter from Ruth, who settled in an armchair beneath the display of weaponry.

With a bronze letter-opener, Olivia carefully pried off the wax seal and drew out the letter.

The letter had also been written on parchment, folded in thirds, with creases as sharp as if they had been made yesterday. Olivia unfolded it to reveal Mother's graceful, fluid hand, in black ink that had faded to sepia:

**"If you are reading this, the time has come."**

Briefly shutting her eyes, Olivia could envision Mother sitting in the same uncomfortable chair, clad in one of her smart Paris-tailored suits, dipping an ivory-handled pen in an inkwell, her brow puckered in thought.

"Please, dear," Ruth urged, "read the letter aloud."

"Very well." **"Fifty years ago, something happened. Fifty years ago, the neighborhood changed."**

"Well, we knew that much," said Ruth. "Go on."

**"The authorities tried to suppress what happened that night, and they succeeded. The papers only reported a 'disturbance.' But we know the truth. **

**"This area used to be called Sakura Heights, in part due to the cherry trees that lined the boulevard. But after that one night, everything changed. You were both away, my dear girls, and we thanked God for that."**

"Sakura Heights." Ruth's hands twisted together. "Of course. Don't you remember how the cherry trees died?"

"And they cut them all down."

"Except for the one in our yard. And to think we've been living here in a sort of oblivious peace all along!"

With a dry mouth, Olivia read:

**"Ruth was up at school, and Olivia was setting up housekeeping on her own. Both of you quite busy."**

Olivia's voice shook. "But we did know. When we came back to visit, Mother and Father were so-"

"-not themselves," concluded Ruth, sorrowful. "So distracted. Silent. Almost-"

"-as though in shock."

"And we never pursued the matter," said Ruth.

"Though we could have. Indeed, we should have."

"We never questioned the cherry trees."

And yet," Olivia said, "in her later years, Mother spoke of the 'contents of the Vault,' and how we would know it was time."

"And the weather that April, which had been so cold-"

"It had gone back to normal when we paid our visit."

They studied one another. "We did know," whispered Ruth.

Olivia nodded, slowly. "Were we afraid, or merely selfish?"

"Both?"

With her staunchly-gathered pluck draining fast, Olivia murmured, "Insulated. Heated. Everything for our comfort and convenience."

"And I am grateful for that," Ruth reminded her. "Don't misunderstand. But I wonder if we had become too comfortable? Veering into complacency?"

"We can't change the past." Olivia straightened her shoulders. "Time enough later for regrets and repentance."

The authorities, Mother noted, had not been regular police, and had commanded them to remain indoors, even going so far as to warn against looking out at the street.

**"But your father and I disregarded their warning, and scurried up to the office, and peered outside. And when we saw what was going on, we thanked Providence once again that you were away, and safe."**

Olivia paused to dab at her stinging eyes. She felt like a child again, missing her parents, but she pasted on a smile for Ruth's benefit.

**"There were unfamiliar cars prowling the street, as though this was a covert operation. One or two people had already been killed, but we did not know this at the time."**

Olivia put down the letter, her face and hands going cold. "Killed? I don't recall anything in the papers."

"Mother said there wouldn't be." But Ruth appeared to be equally shocked by the revelation.

Olivia continued: **"At that time, Mr. Sanrio lived across the street. You will remember him. He loved to garden. And he was generous, giving us roses that we still have in the way of bushes. The roses he gave us were always white, but the next morning they had all turned blood-red. And his house has stood empty since he was murdered."**

"Mr. Sanrio? Murdered?"

"People said it was a heart condition."

"And we just accepted it, along with everything else." Ruth, too, paled. "The secrecy ran deep."

With her back aching from an effort to sit straight, Olivia continued, and the room and the present fell away, and she seemed to be there, fifty years ago, the sights and smells and sounds of the past alive around her.

**"They were walking the street. The killers. **

**"Now you know I have nothing in the way of a sixth sense. But your father's abilities are quite powerful. 'This is of the occult,' he muttered. 'Can't you feel it?' I couldn't, but I could see it. And that was enough to freeze me to the marrow. **

**"There seemed to be an army of them, but my fear may have added to their actual numbers. Perhaps there were ten of them, more or less. I had heard of these creatures, of course, but thought them to be harmless, merely pranksters who enjoyed frightening us humans."**

Olivia caught Ruth's startled gaze. "Us humans?"

**"Your father held me up or I would have passed out right then. Strong man that he was, I felt him shaking. I wanted to let the curtains fall back, I wanted to stop watching, but some force held me there, just as something held us stubbornly to this house. Perhaps we made a mistake, staying here, intending for you to occupy it or sell it as you wished after our departure from this world. Forgive me."**

"Oh, Mother, of course," murmured Olivia.

**"What happened next seemed an illusion. Imagine a balloon, floating away, still attached to the grasping hand, but the string stretching, growing, longer and longer, until it reached the roof-top. **

**"Now imagine the balloon is a head, and the string a neck, yet still attached to the body. From the neck down, these creatures were merely girls. They walked even as you and I. But that is where their resemblance to people ended. For these were monsters. The fabled Rokurokubi."**

"But I thought they were legendary," protested Ruth.

Olivia herself could not quite take it in. She dredged up what she knew of the creatures. Were they violent? Nothing suggested that they were. They were said to lie in wait for unwary people, and enjoyed frightening them when their long, serpentine necks were suddenly revealed.

**"Mr. Sanrio also disobeyed orders. He fled his house. One of the creatures singled him out, ran after him, but then stopped. I breathed a sigh of relief, but it was too soon.**

**For though the monstrous girl stopped pursuing him, though she stood stock-still on the sidewalk, she merely stretched out her neck, four feet, five feet, ten, like a rippling ribbon, overtaking poor Mr. Sanrio, wrapping that deformed neck around him as though she were a strangling snake.**

**"And then-I could not look. But I heard his screams. I hear them still in my dreams.**

Ruth glanced fearfully around, as though the creatures had leapt through space and time and were already at the door.

_It had been dark,_ Olivia thought, _that night, like now, and no one could risk shooting the creature to protect Mr. Sanrio. But he died anyway._

"Rokurokubi," said Ruth, as though trying to steady her nerves, "are supposed to be fairly harmless. Even human by day."

The letter went on to say that after that night, more and more people abandoned the neighborhood, and those who bought houses in their wake also walked out, until the decline into Rokurokubi Block was complete.

"We could follow suit," said Olivia. "Pack it all up and move to England."

"We'll do no such thing and you know it."

Olivia drew a shuddering breath. "There's one last paragraph."

**"A wild irrational terror seized me. I thought if I should glance out the window again, it would be there: a face, staring at me. And then the monster would snake through the window, and wrap itself around me as it did poor Mr. Sanrio. "**

Olivia shut her eyes. The age-old human fear of serpents.

"Olivia," said Ruth, in a voice of such icy calm, that Olivia had to turn, had to look, even though she already knew what she would see.

Before she could steel herself to face it, there came from the window a girl's voice: "We meet at last."

-30-

(To be continued: The call to arms!)


	14. All In Green

Please read Disclaimer in Chapter One.

Title: Maya's Tale (C14: All In Green)

Author: JaganshiKenshin

Genre: Action/Adventure, General

Rating: K+/PG-13 (for anime-style fight scenes/language)

Summary: While Kurama wonders if he'll pass the exam, the Kawasaki sisters encounter a monster.

A/N: Rokurokubi, those mythical Japanese creatures who look human, who might even believe they are human, can extend their necks to outlandish, Alice-in-Wonderland lengths. Some famous Japanese prints depict a few of them lounging around, their heads floating far above their bodies, as they smoke their pipes in dreamy contentment.

"Father is quite gifted."

Maya's Tale (14: All In Green)

by

Kenshin

Kurama was frustrated.

_Do I even want to take that test? Do I want to continue in school? Or returning to Makai? Or becoming a street juggler?_

All he really wanted now was a good night's sleep.

Failing that, he would settle for squeaking by on the test. College courses were proving unexpectedly more difficult than either middle or high school. Chemistry eluded him, mocked him.

Unable to concentrate at home, Kurama had just dashed back to the house for his backpack, intending to leave straight away for St. Francis Xavier's. He was on his way to the door when the phone rang.

His backpack was laden with study materials for the exam. He had given up looking for an 'incident' that had occurred on Rokurokubi Block fifty years ago.

Not even researcher extraordinaire Kaitou Yuu had been able to find anything, though Kaitou had confirmed April temperatures were also recorded extremely low back then.

The phone shrilled on.

Answer. Don't answer. The straps of the backpack bit into Kurama's shoulders.

He had an uneasy feeling who the caller might be.

This was his turning point. He knew it.

Sighing, Kurama lifted the receiver. "Yes?"

"Minamino, dear." It was Olivia's gentle, cultured voice.

Kurama intended to rush her off the phone, to plead the case for last-minute study, but before he could speak, Olivia said:

"Do you know what a Rokurokubi is?"

Of all the things she might have said, this was the last Kurama expected. In complete puzzlement, he replied, "Yes, but what's that got to do with-"

"I am in my office now, looking at one." Olivia's voice was distant, floating. "And she is looking at me."

The backpack slid from his shoulders, fell with a dull thud.

Rokurokubi are half-human creatures who often do not realize what they are, living in the daytime as humans, until night rings in a profound change, and they go into action.

Lying in wait for unwary humans, they delight in the shock and terror they cause when they suddenly display their distorted, serpentine necks.

Of course he knew; in fact the block where the sisters lived had been named for those creatures.

Rokurokubi seemed more like pranksters than anything sinister. They were nothing for even Minamino Shuuichi to fear, let alone Kurama, but-

For two elderly ladies, living alone in a half-abandoned neighborhood, for all their blithe chatter about guns...

His throat was dry. He swallowed.

"Yes, I know what a Rokurokubi is. Don't try to deal with it yourselves. Leave the-"

"Listen to me." Olivia's voice cut across Kurama's like a whip. "Do as I say. Assemble any allies you can muster, and go at once to the house at the end of our street."

"But-"

"Never mind us. Save Maya."

0-0-0-0-0

"Maya," the strange creature repeated.

Her face was that of a girl's. Her neck was a serpent's clad in human flesh, long, sinuous, boneless. "In danger. At the end of the block. I can't help. Too much the coward."

Olivia's hand remained frozen to the phone.

The creature's head and neck were well inside the window. Her face floated about four feet from Olivia's. _I could swear that window was locked,_ thought Olivia.

"The girl," she repeated, her voice as pale and wan as the color of her skin.

In spite of Olivia's brave words to Mr. Minamino, her heart leapt, labored, jarred her ribcage.

Shunning the use of the blunderbuss, the Meiji-era cannon in good working order, or the American Civil War sword, Ruth reached above her chair for the good old Browning shotgun.

They still possessed one weapon they hadn't mentioned to the Minamino boy. A .22-caliber Taurus pistol in the desk drawer. Releasing the phone, Olivia tried to will her hand to grasp the knob, open the drawer, get the gun.

The Rokurokubi was on the move now. Her head and neck snaked around the office, searching, searching, peering into every corner, at every painting. Examining a room on the second story of the house, while still standing outside.

This alone stood Olivia's hair on end.

The creature made her inspection of the office, murmuring to herself all the while. And then she stopped.

For Olivia had caught her attention. Abandoning the paintings, she studied Olivia now with the same keen curiosity.

Ruth stood, and brought the Browning to bear.

But the strange girl took no notice of Ruth or the expert way in which she held the shotgun. Moving closer to her quarry, she spiraled her head, and where her head went, so went her neck until her neck was a corkscrew with Olivia at its center.

The human revulsion for snakes. Mr. Sanrio across the street, crushed, then torn to pieces. Olivia hardly breathed.

_Try not to think about cobras._ The creature's head sat well above the corkscrew of her neck, eerily reminiscent of the way a cobra coils to strike.

Did Rokurokubi have fangs? Were they venomous?

Ruth would be thinking the same thing.

But so thoroughly had the Roku-girl's freakish neck encircled Olivia, though not actually touching her, that Ruth would be unable to get a clear shot.

The Taurus semi-automatic pistol, at close range, might do the trick. It held eight rounds, and was only five inches long and less than twelve inches away in that center drawer.

Even if Olivia had been able to reach the comfort of the pistol, neither could she shoot without risking harm to Ruth.

She didn't have to see Ruth to know that Ruth would be in an agony of suspense.

If only the damned thing would back off.

With her eyes on the creature, Olivia's left hand gripped the round brass knob and slid the desk drawer open an inch.

Olivia's gun hand, however, was pinned to her side, though the girl's neck was not touching her. Still, that neck...

Gripped by a fear of the serpent as old as mankind, Olivia had no desire to brush against the pale pink flesh.

Eight rounds. Twelve inches. Out of reach.

The hovering creature was close enough for Olivia to look up into her eyes. They were greenish brown, the colors of moss-fringed earth. They were filled with curiosity, so-human.

The set of the girl's features, the look in her eyes. She did not seem so much a threat as afraid.

Afraid, yet determined, eager, like a child seeing a vast garden for the first time.

Olivia released the knob. No, she could not shoot this strange, deformed creature. In a low voice, she asked, "What do you want of us?"

"Maya." Repeating what she had said before Olivia hung up the phone, the Roku-girl insisted, "In danger."

If you ignored her freakish ribbon of a neck, the Rokurokubi didn't look much like a monster.

Olivia saw a well-scrubbed face with a snub nose and a wide mouth. There was a hint of the exotic in the moss-and-earth eyes that turned up at the corners. Straight, un-groomed eyebrows drew slightly down, and her voice was hesitant, even timid.

"The one you call Maya," she repeated, as though she was not certain they understood. "In danger. Try not to blame him. The house at the end of the block."

"Yes." Fear made Ruth sound harsh. "So you've said."

The girl said, "Telephone that man."

"That man?" With the girl's face bobbing a mere fifteen inches from her own, Olivia kept her voice low, soothing.

"The one who has the dreams," said the girl. "He must have had them. He must. I tried so hard."

Ruth lowered the shotgun. "We already called."

"I- oh, yes." The strange girl nodded, making her neck ripple like a Slinky-toy. "So you did. I am relieved."

"Relieved?" Olivia was beginning to breathe again.

"Oh!" The Roku-girl peered at Olivia. Her eyes widened. "My neck. Did I do that again? I am so sorry."

The long neck began to corkscrew in reverse, untangling from Olivia. The girl seemed about to get it in a knot in her haste to unwind, and the swift retreat would have been comical if not for the eerie deformity that caused it.

When Olivia was at last clear of the coils, the girl's head and neck still protruded some six feet from the curtained window.

"Oh." Coming from that respectable distance, the girl's words were easier to take. "Forgive my excitement. I forget! Lately I forget all the time. I'll just come in the front, shall I? May I please, just this once? I can't tell you how much I've longed to see the inside of this wonderful house."

The initial shock of the harrowing encounter was, mercifully, fading. Beat by beat, Olivia's heart was returning to its normal, sturdy rhythm.

Ask her in? Why not?

The strange girl seemed more distracted than dangerous. And painfully earnest. She had not attacked. She had in fact warned them Maya was in danger.

They must focus on Maya, and what they might learn from this Roku-girl about the nature of her peril.

Olivia asked the strange girl. "W-would you like some-"

"Some tea?" The Roku-girl's moss-and-earth eyes widened in unalloyed delight. "Just like an invitation? Do you really mean it? Oh, I've been waiting for you to ask!"

Her face retreated like a balloon reeled in by unseen hands. The curtains parted. Her head popped back through, the curtains fell to again, and she was lost to their sight.

Olivia sat listening to the faint gong of the mantle clock. It was past eight.

Then she got up and went to the window. It was closed. And locked. She looked at Ruth. Ruth was racking the shotgun.

"Did we dream this?" Olivia wondered.

But even as the words left her mouth, she heard the knock on the door.

Ruth replied with admirable composure. "Apparently not."

"Maybe," Olivia said slowly, "this is our second chance."

"We may as well hear what she has to say," agreed Ruth.

"I'll make the tea," said Olivia.

Ruth nodded, giving the shotgun a last pat. "The cookies are already out."

In five minutes' time, the strange girl, her neck now looking like any human's, sat with Olivia and Ruth in the parlor.

The tea was scented with bergamot, and the cookies were of a kind that Maya had particularly liked: thin crisp wafers half-dipped in milk chocolate.

The girl wore a dress of heavy green wool that was the color of Maya's old sweat shirt. Somewhat awkwardly, she grasped a cookie. When she glanced at Olivia, and saw that plates had been provided for the cookies, she placed hers down.

_As if,_ Olivia thought, _she does not know what to do._

"Now," said Ruth, folding her hands in her lap. "Maya's in danger? Tell us about it."

"And then we must fly," added Olivia.

For a few moments, the girl studied her teacup as though it was an alien artifact. When she glanced back up at them, her eyes were swimming. "Father is really very gifted," she began.

-30-

(To be continued: Sometimes allies come in handy.)


	15. Capture

Please read Disclaimer in Chapter One.

Title: Maya's Tale (C15: Capture)

Author: JaganshiKenshin

Genre: Action/Adventure, General

Rating: K+/PG-13 (for anime-style fight scenes/language)

Summary: A 'haunted palace' holds the key to a mystery.

A/N: The Block from Chapter Black continues to fascinate me.

"Is this my second chance?"

Maya's Tale (15: Capture)

by

Kenshin

_"Fifty years ago something happened. Fifty years ago the neighborhood changed."_

His breath pluming in the frigid air, Kurama watched the suspect's house from the shelter of the undergrowth. Though in good repair outside, the house looked abandoned, dark, silent.

The moon flung knife-edged shadows across Kurama's allies: Hiei, alert as a stalking panther, Shayla Kidd, shivering but game nonetheless, noting the structure's appearance, asking, "Is Maya even _in_ there?"

"Let's find out," replied Hiei. "Bust down the door."

Kurama grinned. "Know what I like about you, Hiei?"

"Can't imagine what you're referring to." Hiei, repeating word-for-word what Kurama had said when they had met at dawn.

"I gave you all sorts of trash this morning, and yet you show up now with no recriminations, no I-told-you-sos."

Hiei snorted. "Canonize me after we get that girl back. Besides, I'd do anything to escape Grandma Hirameki."

From the moment Kurama heard that Maya had been kidnaped, an anger as cold and remote as the moon had seized him, and he enjoyed a mental clarity he had not felt in weeks. Kurama refreshed, power at his fingertips.

If not for the fact that it was Maya in danger, he might have been exhilarated.

But perhaps that was the point all along: Maya, held captive again, and Kurama must free her.

Was this an opportunity for redemption, a second chance, a call to honesty about his feelings toward the girl?

Through chattering teeth, Shayla Kidd wondered, "The sisters... will they b-be all right, alone with a monster?"

"Miss Olivia and Miss Ruth are armed. We'll have to trust their skill." As for weaponry, though Kurama had fled his house the moment he arranged a ride from Hiei, his hair was well-loaded. "And you?"

Hiei flicked aside his jacket to reveal his sword. Shay-san nodded, blowing on her bare hands to warm them. Somewhere under her hooded jacket would be her Beretta. Kurama was no gunsmith, but he knew you couldn't pull a trigger with frozen fingers.

Hiei had parked his car the next block over, and the three of them had cut through the crook-shaped belt of trees that separated Rokurokubi Block from the other neighborhood.

Curious, too, that those trees should even be there. With land at such a premium, surely the builders could have squeezed in a few more houses on that strip of land.

It was as though no one wanted to live closer to Rokurokubi Block. Whatever the reason, it worked to their advantage, for the undergrowth provided shelter while Kurama studied the house.

The house was three stories tall, and apart from a turret facing the woods, it was a slab-sided rectangle, nowhere near as large as the home of the Kawasaki sisters.

The chest-high iron fencing that surrounded it on all sides lent it the aspect of a fortress. All it needed was a moat.

To think that he should end up back here, after Hiei cut down the dead Bartholomew tree by means of hurling his sword like a spear, Kurama retrieving the 'spear' with his own Thrashvine.

It was also in these woods that Kurama had encountered the eerie, threatening voice. Both incidents now seemed not a mere oddity or coincidence, but the hand of fate.

"What now?" Hiei asked. "I could get up on the roof for a quick recon and be back before anyone knew I was there."

"I could go lend those sisters a hand," put in Shay-san.

If Kurama had tossed aside his schoolbooks, Hiei and Shay-san had cut short a costume rehearsal as the Prince and Princess of the Haunted Palace, dragging on whatever street clothes they could snatch as quickly as they had flung off tights and tutus. Dressed in sweat pants and hooded jackets in various degrees of disrepair, they looked more like ragamuffins than elite commandos in the Shadow Wars.

"I'd prefer we stay together. Something's off. Maybe it's the block, or the house itself, but I'm sensing-"

"A strange kind of youki?" Shay-san moved closer to Hiei.

Hiei grunted. "Maybe not youki... not a vampire either."

Shayla Kidd hissed in a breath.

"Whatever it is, I can't identify it until we get closer." Kurama leading the way, they departed the undergrowth, crossed a strip of beaten-down weeds, and reached the iron fence at the edge of the property.

"Up and over," Kurama instructed. They scaled the iron in hasty stealth, Kurama first, Hiei assisting Shayla Kidd into his care, then hopping over last.

But when Kurama had touched the icy metal of the fence, he sensed a change, as if a blanket had been thrown over him, muffling his sixth sense.

Though he could still perceive the normal world in the moon's blue glow on iron, the sounds of distant traffic, the leaf-and-bark scents from the woods, his 'early warning system,' that ineffable means by which he sensed youki, was on the blink.

Had someone cast a Territory? No. This was different, more gradual, as when twilight overcomes the day.

More like the slow onset of an illness than the activation of a Territory, an almost feverish drain of power.

He still had one hand on the iron railing. He let go. The effect remained.

Hiei kept his voice down. "You feel that?"

_So it's not just me?_ Kurama nodded.

Though he had no sixth sense to speak of now, perhaps he could still access his old king-of-thieves knowledge. Signaling the others to remain, Kurama glided across twenty feet of dead lawn, then peered into a back window. He got close enough for his breath to mist the window, but nothing showed on the other side, no speck of light, as if the window had been painted black.

There was no back door. That, too, was unusual. The Kawasaki sisters had no less than three, perhaps four, entrances. Kurama's own house had two.

He signaled his allies to cross the lawn. "Front door," Kurama said, and they circled the house.

The door was made of wood, with four carved panels, a blacked-out fan window set high, and an ordinary-looking lock. Kurama flicked a glance at Hiei.

Motioning the others back, Hiei raised one hand and casually fire-blasted the lock.

Or he _tried_ to.

Hiei used the correct stance, the same motions he always used for a fire attack, but no flame emerged from his hand.

Hiei said a bad word.

"So much for stealth," murmured Shay-san.

"I was afraid of that," said Kurama. "Our powers-"

Shay-san glanced up, her gray eyes unhappy. "Suppressed?"

"Doesn't matter. We have a sword. A gun. And this." Exchanging places with Hiei, Kurama knew it had been a while since he'd picked a lock, but once he started, his hands knew their way.

Hiei and Shay-san watched in respectful silence.

First Kurama attempted to loid the lock with a simple credit card. No go. He took out a torque wrench-a small, L-shaped piece of sturdy metal-and a shallow steel pick that was longer than the wrench, straight with a triangular end. The wrench he placed in the lower portion of the keyhole. Using the pick, he felt for each pin inside the lock.

There were five pins, all their pointed cylindrical ends oriented downward. Each time Kurama pressed up with the pick, he felt the telltale click that spoke of success.

The pins out of the way, he turned the wrench, using it like a key, and the door opened on soundless, well-oiled hinges.

"Done," he said. They walked into a long cold hallway with no one there to stop them.

Had Shayla Kidd been correct? Was this a false alarm, an abandoned building?

The only way to make sure was to search.

Leaving the door partway open behind them, Kurama could see well enough, and not just because of the decor-the walls hung with pale silk, the floors gleaming pale marble-but by the moonlight that poured in from the fan-shaped window.

A window which had, from the outside, been blacked out.

Shayla Kidd murmured, "That feeling from before-"

"Stronger," Hiei replied.

"I couldn't cast a spell to save my life."

"Don't even think it," said Kurama, but she was right. With this cloying, choking suppression, could he summon enough spirit power to activate any of his plant weapons?

Hiei put a hand on his sword. "And the weird youki-?"

"Can't sense it now," replied Kurama. "Not that I could under these conditions. We don't know whether our powers are being suppressed by man or machine."

"That girl could be anywhere," Hiei muttered.

"Where do we start?" said Shay-san.

Hiei indicated a faint light, three-quarters of the way down the hall, a light that painted the marble a paler color.

They had taken only a few steps when Kurama halted, struck motionless by another dizzying change. "What the-?"

Quick as a thought, the silk-hung walls shriveled and blackened. Marble crumbled beneath their feet. A smell of mold and dust suffused the air, and they stood in the middle of a bleak ruin.

"Haunted Palace." Shayla Kidd's voice quavered a little.

"Yeah." Hiei steadied her. "Like the set drawings." He sounded angry. Kurama thought that was a good sign.

_The opposite of Toad's Palace,_ Kurama thought, _new outside, decay inside._

Dust sifted over their shoulders. Kurama glanced up. The ceiling was far gone, in danger of caving in. Plaster hung down in strips like the skin of a flayed animal.

But light still burned from the door down the hall. They picked their way over broken flooring toward the illumination, dust snowing overhead, grit crunching underfoot.

The door wasn't locked. They opened it.

When Kurama saw what lay in the room, his heart leapt, then pumped what felt like ice water.

Shayla Kidd gave a little gasp; Hiei was silent, but his hard-edged anger was as clear as though he had spat words.

There would be no spells cast, no flame attacks, and Kurama himself was all but crippled, unable to deploy his Rose Whip.

This was the only room in the house still in good repair, and it looked new-minted: circular in shape, though from the outside, the slab-sided walls had no curve on this facade. It was sparsely furnished, with a table, a chair off to one side, and a few other items.

The vaulted ceiling and the rounded walls were light and bright with a chill, acid-yellow illumination. The floor was laid in black rubber, and its odor stung the nostrils and caught in the throat.

Floating in mid-air, in the carousel motion of Kurama's recurring dream, were the cards.

As in the dream, making a slow circle around their subject. But without the blurring dream-fog, he was able to see that they were not cards, but photographs.

Of Maya.

Maya, at the door of the Kawasaki house. Maya, on her little black scooter, headed down the street. Maya, going inside Muktananda's home. Maya, everywhere.

Similar photographs lined the walls and ceiling, and every image had one thing in common. Each had been taken without the subject's knowledge.

The seed of cold anger grew in Kurama's heart, leaving no space for mercy.

Close to the far wall stood a man of about 60. Bigger than Kuwabara, and solidly built, though the exact nature of his physique was hidden under a fur-collared winter coat.

His dark hair was touched with gray, but no frost lightened his bristling brows, nor the goatee beneath his thick red mouth. His skin was sickly-pale by contrast.

He gave them a single contemptuous glance from deep-set eyes the color of winter ice.

Next to him was a rolling medical cart. On the cart was a stainless steel instrument tray.

The tray held scalpels and forceps and syringes. On a nearby table were laboratory flasks bubbling black, orange, and bilious green. Their rotten-egg stink momentarily stamped out the smell of black rubber.

In front of the man was a gurney draped in white sheets. And floating above the surface of the gurney lay Maya herself, her eyes blank and unseeing, her mouth opened on a silent scream.

-30-

(To be continued: A curse to strip the walls of paint.)


	16. Welcome The Stranger

Please read Disclaimer in Chapter One.

Title: Maya's Tale (C16: Welcome The Stranger)

Author: JaganshiKenshin

Genre: Action/Adventure, General

Rating: K+/PG-13 (for anime-style fight scenes/language)

Summary: The Kawasaki sisters learn the truth about the cameraman.

A/N: _Idiot Beloved_ takes place shortly after the Dark Tournament; _Firebird Sweet_ directly follows that timeline. For certain character developments, you might read them in order. I appreciate your reviews and thanks for reading this tale!

"Don't blame him for what he is!"

Maya's Tale (16: Welcome The Stranger )

by

Kenshin

If you were just looking at surface appearances, the Kawasaki residence was cozy, safe and warm.

The fire crackled. The clock ticked. And the strange girl, teacup in hand, went on about her 'gifted' father.

But beneath the surface was the matter of Maya's kidnaping. And the fact that the girl was not exactly human.

Olivia told herself: _Two ladies of our caliber would not simply leave Maya to chance. Even with this rather pathetic Roku-girl here, we would take our weapons and fly to her aid._

So why were they lingering?

"My dear." Olivia addressed the girl, not knowing her name, "I'm sorry. But we must go now and help Maya."

The girl didn't look up. "You can't."

"I insist."

"Please feel free to remain here," Ruth chimed in. "We can see that you have much to tell us, and that this house fascinates you. You'll be quite safe. Explore as you wish. Help yourself to anything you like in the kitchen."

The girl began to tremble. "You can't," she repeated.

"We'll return soon enough." Ruth got up from the sofa, flashing Olivia a determined look. "Don't worry."

"Get the shotgun," Olivia instructed her.

The girl shook her head. "You won't be able to." She shot Olivia a fleeting glance, then added, "It's for your own good."

Olivia kept her gaze on the girl, but her remark was addressed to Ruth. "What does she mean?"

Ruth strode to the door. She tried it. Olivia found herself hoping the knob worked as usual. Turning to Olivia, Ruth was still and calm, her voice as cool as when she had seen the Rokurokubi in the office. "It's locked."

Olivia put a hand to her throat.

"The windows will be locked, too." The girl in green sounded truly unhappy. "I seem to be able to do that. Yes, that is one thing I can do. And I will not open them."

Olivia was staring down at the girl, with no memory of having risen. "But why?"

"You could not deal with Father. I know you are brave and clever. But you would not survive."

"If that is so," said Olivia, forcing gentleness into her voice, "what do you imagine he will do to Maya?"

"I _know_ what he will do to Maya. That's why I came." She looked up, her earth-and-moss eyes swimming. "Please. I-" She broke off. "Please."

Olivia sank back onto the sofa. _If we remain here, if we allow harm to befall Maya, then we will be guilty of the same complacency into which we sank fifty years ago._

"We can smash the glass in a window," said Ruth.

"And call the police," added Olivia.

"He would know," said the girl. She seemed a dreary little figure now, her head bent in great misery almost to her knees. "Father would know. It will end with everyone in ashes."

"Nonsense," said Ruth, but her voice quavered.

While Olivia was thinking furiously of a way out, Ruth spoke again: "Who is your father? Describe him."

The girl composed herself as if reciting. As she described her father, gooseflesh prickled across Olivia's skin, for all that the fire blazed.

"He is tall," the girl said, "with dark hair and a little well-trimmed beard. He wears a thick coat, and a fur hat he wears outdoors, and red gloves."

Ruth gave an involuntary cry.

Olivia thought, _Of course. That man. I knew it, yet didn't want to believe it. That chilling aura of his! For all that we're armed, we are not young. Could we react quickly enough?_

"And he carries a camera," she added dully.

"That's right." The little Rokurokubi girl flashed Olivia a look of surprise. "I can't help," she insisted. "The one named Maya. Neither can you. Maybe that man could. That is why I told you to call him."

Young Mr. Minamino. Maya's friend.

From the moment she had laid eyes on him, Olivia had sensed that here was a man of courage and quality.

She recalled her terse instructions to Mr. Minamino. Had she said enough? Would he know what to do?

Olivia was no longer afraid of the girl, but... "It's after ten." She glanced at the clock. "He should have arrived at that house by now. Did we hear a car?"

Still pale with fear, Ruth shook her head. "No."

_Still, one has to try._ "Dear," said Olivia, "we have a shotgun, and a pistol. We know how to use them. I believe-"

"A shotgun?" The girl had been focused on the stairwell, but she jerked her gaze from it to regard Olivia. "I do not think a shotgun would stop Father."

"And that young man could?"

"I think... I hope..." The girl's voice trailed away.

_And still one tries._ Knowing what she would find, Olivia hurried to the door, and tried to work the knob. "Locked." The thought of breaking a window and running down the street was a strong temptation, but then she thought, _Would we make this situation worse for Maya by rushing in? Have we misunderstood?_

_All right, doors and windows locked, and she's an odd little thing and my heart goes out to her, but we need facts._

She returned to the sofa, and made an effort to sweep her fears aside, if only for the moment. "If you won't let us leave, or call the police, at least tell us what's happening."

"I will try my best to explain."

"Then we shall have to trust to Mr. Minamino now," said Ruth. "And I sense that hearing this girl out may be important."

Hearing Ruth, the girl gave a great sigh. Her hands were shaking, but she lifted the cup to her lips and managed a sip.

The girl did not complain, but Olivia knew the tea was cold. She re-filled the girl's cup, and then Ruth's and her own.

Now that they had determined to stay, Olivia vowed that this time, things would be different. She would neither pretend, nor look away.

Once she had made that decision, it wasn't so bad. The fire was warm, and made the room smell nice. The clock sounded cheerful. The tea tasted good.

The Roku-girl was about Maya's age and size, but while Maya was a beauty, this girl was plain. Her hair was the color of a paper bag, and strained back from her wide forehead into a bun too old to suit her. Her wool dress, dark green like Maya's favorite sweat jacket, was most unflattering, but she wore it like a badge of honor.

In the brighter light of the parlor, Olivia also noted that the girl had the merest film of dust on her shoulders and shoes. Had the office curtains been dirty? But the only the girl's head had touched them, and her hair was free of the dust.

She had a certain skittish, off-beat charm, as though she had been isolated from human company until now, was seeing a home where actual people lived for the first time, and was eager to make a good impression.

Her well-scrubbed face could radiate such joy that Olivia had to wonder why Mother had been afraid of these creatures at.

And she was back to examining the room, while keeping her neck quite in its proper place. Her gaze danced around, then lit upon the green Sevres vase filled with artificial sweet peas.

"_Such_ a pretty vase! And oh, what a color!"

Olivia couldn't help smiling. "You like it?"

"Yes! I can't even express how much."

_I believe when all is said and done,_ thought Olivia, _I shall give her the vase._ "What is your name, dear?"

Her smile faded. "I haven't one."

"But that's impossible," said Olivia, "everyone has a-"

A look from Ruth quelled her.

"Then," said Ruth, "we shall just have to give you a name. But first, tell us why Maya is being held in that house."

This seemed to focus her attention. "Of course. I fear my visit is not of a strictly social nature." She glanced about the parlor again. "But I've never had tea with anyone before."

"My dear," Ruth began, her voice troubled.

"Anyone but Father, that is." Lowering her gaze, the girl put her teacup down. "I...please." She lifted her earnest gaze to Olivia's. "Try not to blame him, will you?"

"Blame him for what?" The rate at which answers came seemed hideously slow. But Olivia knew impatience would get them nowhere, and one glance at Ruth proved they were in accord. "Do go on, dear."

"That man Maya liked. I tried to warn him, but I don't think I am very good at that."

"Good?" Ruth offered the girl another cookie, but she seemed not to see it. "At what?"

A frown of concentration creased the girl's brow. "Sending pictures to someone. Father is quite gifted in all aspects of that art."

"Yes. You said he was gifted. "But about Maya-"

"Father can make an ordinary camera take pictures of a person who is not present at a particular time or place, but who was there at an earlier moment."

"Pictures of people who aren't there?" Olivia thought of Maya, as a courier, making deliveries to their house. _If that man was taking pictures, it wasn't of our house. It was-_

"Well, they _were_ there, at one point."

"I'm afraid I don't understand." Ruth tapped her own head gently. "Getting old, you see."

"I am not certain how it works. Suppose you left this room tonight and went into the city. Father could enter this parlor and point his camera at the sofa where you had been seated. And somehow, he captures you sipping tea on the sofa."

Ruth's look was puzzled. "Though we are no longer here?"

"Maybe it has to do with memory, or psychic impressions. Father does not like to discuss the details. But yes. Later, when the photographs are developed, your image will be on them."

"Pictures of people." Ruth cast an uneasy glance at Olivia. "People who are not present when the photograph is taken?"

"Yes. Oh, I'm not at all good at this! I was never any good at explaining. And I _will_ forget about my neck. That is why I stopped accompanying Father on his walks. He realized how forgetful I am becoming, and he-"

"Please," Ruth urged. "About Maya-"

"Father is a wonderful photographer, but I am less than wonderful at being able to look into danger and convey its meaning to another." The girl glanced at her plate, surprised to find a new cookie there. She dipped it in her tea and nibbled it. "Oh!" She stopped, a hint of pink warming her pale cheeks. "Is this all right? I mean, is it permitted?"

"It's fine," assured Ruth, dipping her own cookie.

"Please go on, dear."

"I find it hard enough to explain how it's done, this image-taking, and I'm not at all sure that man could get my messages."

Olivia sipped the bergamot-scented tea, but it had lost its flavor. She strove to organize what the girl was saying in a neat, orderly line, but failed. "And your father lives in the house on the cul-de-sac?"

"Perhaps," Ruth said, "if you explained step by step what he means to do to Maya? ..."

"Very well." The girl straightened. "I am the last of Father's daughters. Most of my sisters were captured, and I imagine, disposed of, the night they were born."

While Olivia tried to comprehend, Ruth's voice fell to a whisper. "That night in Mother's letter?"

"You knew your mother?" The girl's eyes flew wide. "You spoke with her, walked with her, touched her?"

In spite of Maya's peril, in spite of being trapped in the house, Olivia felt her heart twist with pity for this girl. She hastily gulped more tea for an excuse to dab her eyes. "Tea," she explained. "Hot."

"Your sisters were born fully grown?" Ruth inquired.

"I didn't join them that night," the girl went on. "I never left the house. I was afraid. I simply didn't have the heart for it. Father was cross with me."

"I'll just bet he was," muttered Ruth.

"You mustn't blame him," she added quickly. "Father is who he is, and he has lost so many children over the years."

_Over the years,_ thought Olivia. _This girl is not yet twenty-five. Or so she looks. But that night was fifty years ago._ "How were they lost?"

The girl looked at the Sevres vase. "Everyone wants a family, don't they?"

"I believe so." Olivia wanted to snap her next words, but did not "And what of your family?"

"My sisters are gone. They went out at the hour of their birth and I think it has been a long time since then. Father was unable to get them to stop."

"Stop what?"

The girl colored again. "I forget so easily. And lately it's been worse. Father always said we should have moved when it all went wrong that night, but he also says he is stubborn."

"So are we," said Ruth. "Now, Maya-"

"Father had told me of his... of our... family history. He keeps trying to create a family. Father once lived in Europe, but then had to move to Japan. Every time he loses his family, he changes location. Except this last time. It was a very pretty neighborhood. It still is, of course," she added hastily.

Olivia said, "And where was your mother in all this?"

"Mother died giving us life. They always do."

Into the silence that followed, the clock ticked.

"Father is very wise, very learned." The girl's voice faltered. She sounded as if she was trying to convince herself more than Olivia and Ruth. "He has had this experience again and again. How sad to lose one's entire family in a single night!"

Ruth glanced sidelong at Olivia. But Olivia was at a loss. _I don't know what to do. I don't know how to grasp the threads of this strange creature's story and make sense of them._ "This same tragedy will befall Maya? How?"

The girl studied her fingernails. "I believe I am somewhat like Mother," she said, "more so perhaps than her other daughters. My sisters had a taste for the same foods Father does. I do not. I prefer things like tea and biscuits. Nothing with blood in it."

_Blood?_ Olivia's fingers twitched. _Patience,_ she advised herself, _Calm. Suppose we did phone the police. What exactly would we tell them? Would they arrive sirens blazing? Would that tip off this camera fiend?_

"But you see," continued the girl, "that is why I had to come. No matter how I longed for a new mother, even if only for one hour, I would not have this happen to the one named Maya."

"Have _what_ happen?" Ruth leaned forward. "Please."

"I had wondered what she was like, my mother. All these years, I had wondered. And of course there was the medium." The girl set down her teacup quickly. "He's gone now." Her hands twisted in her lap. "The medium. But I had wondered whether one with such skills could help me speak to my own mother. And of course that is why that girl came inside the house. I had wondered if we could be friends, she and I." The soft shy voice rose a little, the words ran together. "But she always hung back, she never came inside. This time, Father told her the medium was there. Of course he wasn't, he isn't anywhere now, but all the same I had wondered."

Olivia thought, _Maya had been going to that psychic for nearly a year. Was that when we first saw the camera fiend?_

But the girl was drifting off into tangents, while Olivia was intent on finding facts.

"Dear," Olivia hoped that her questions would help the girl focus. "We knew Maya was seeing a medium. Leave that aside for the moment. But about tonight-what is happening now?"

The girl shot her a grateful glance. "Yes. Tonight. Let me recall." She closed her eyes a moment, then continued. "Although he wanted me to do so, I did not help Father get her to that room. That Maya. I did not want the same thing to happen to her that happened to my own mother. Not what had happened to my mother. Not that. I looked for a way. Her scooter was there. Parked right outside!"

She got that radiant look again. "It tempted me. The scooter. And you were so close by. I knew that you could do something to help, even if only to call that man."

"Mr. Minamino?"

"Is that his name? I did not know his name but I saw his face. Because Maya would think of him. I saw him one day from my tower. He is grown now, but still the same. And there was another man who has a sword."

Olivia did not even need to glance at Ruth to feel her sister's flash of hope.

"Those two were doing something to a tree when I saw them," the girl explained. "It made Father cross."

The clock ticked on. The fire hissed softly. Ruth's voice was gentle. "What happened tonight? To Maya?"

"Oh." The girl put a hand to her face. "Tonight. I left Father to his own devices and just got on the scooter. It was my first ride! I am amazed that I could get it to work. It seemed so fast, like I was flying."

"But is Maya-"

"She is there. With Father." The girl's moss-and-earth eyes flicked up and around. "I will try to control myself. I will try to explain." She went on more soberly, "I never knew Mother, and I know that girl had lost hers. I have no sisters left, either, yet this seemed to make Maya and myself sisters after a fashion."

Olivia pondered. Inevitable that a man who knew Maya should come to see them out of the blue. That the medium should be part of this sequence of events, that the dangers of fifty years past seemed to be recreating themselves, that Mother's letter about the Rokurokubi should be read at the instant one such girl came to pay them a visit and deliver a warning and a second chance.

But if they were unable to leave the house, how could this _be_ their second chance?

Ruth spoke. "Tell me if I got this right. Your sisters were born on a night-some time ago. There was murder done on this block, and it was covered up. Your sisters were disposed of? By whom? And why did the authorities then not find you? Or your father?"

"They could not see the house." The girl gazed thoughtfully at Ruth. "Father did not wish them to see."

"Then how will Mr. Minamino be able to see it?"

"Maya could see it. He will, too. He and Maya can see things others can't. Father's concentration will be on Maya."

Olivia knew why. _He wants a new 'mother.' For his 'children.' We would have been too late the moment-_

"I should have come sooner." The girl lifted her teacup again and looked pleadingly at Olivia. "But I'm not at all brave, and not at all strong. This man, is he strong?"

"He will have to be," said Ruth.

There was nothing more to be said. Their second chance was an illusion. Fate had defeated them after all.

"You are both so wonderful," the girl said. "I'm glad Father is not here. That new camera of his..." She trailed off, peering about as someone awakening from a dream, not yet sure where she is.

She placed her cup down again, as if it might shatter. "Please," whispered the girl, not daring to look up. "Please, will you tell me what it's like to know one's mother?"

The words went right to Olivia's heart, and she needed a moment to compose herself. With a silent prayer for the success of Mr. Minamino, she wondered whether perhaps this, after all, was their mission after all-merely to speak, merely to listen.

_I shall adopt this poor girl,_ she vowed. _When Maya is back safe, and that camera fiend behind bars, I shall adopt this girl._

Then, taking a deep breath, Olivia told the girl of several small incidents with Mother, nothing much, just events from ordinary life. Browsing for treasures at a flea market. Planting Mr. Sanrio's white roses. Driving to the heart of the city to try a new French restaurant.

Ruth offered reminiscences of her own. The tea grew cold. The clock on the mantelpiece ticked on. The fire crackled.

It was nearing midnight.

"Thank you," said the girl, when they had finished. "Thank you. That was wonderful."

"What name would you like, dear?" Ruth prodded.

"Name?" The girl seemed thoroughly bewildered.

"When this is over, you may stay with us," said Olivia. "And we must know what to call you."

When she smiled, her wide mouth trembled. "I am glad Father and his cameras are not here." Carefully, as though they were made of soap bubbles, she reached over and touched her cup and plate. "You are both so kind. Whatever happens to me is not important now. The important thing is, I was able to meet with you, share tea with you. I got to know you."

And Olivia, who had not been able to muster the slightest fear of the girl after the first shock of her appearance, now felt fear rise in her throat to choke away reason.

The girl in green spoke distractedly. "When you see that girl. When you see her. That girl. Tell that girl, tell her-"

And then she stopped speaking altogether. And what followed was terrible.

-30-

(To be continued: The death of an ally.)


	17. With A Gun

Please read Disclaimer in Chapter One.

Title: Maya's Tale (C17: With A Gun)

Author: JaganshiKenshin

Genre: Action/Adventure, General

Rating: K+/PG-13 (for anime-style fight scenes/language)

Summary: A moment's hesitation costs dearly.

A/N: For reference, I use a combination of the American YYH manga and the subtitled anime.

I appreciate your reviews and thank you for reading this tale!

"Let her go!"

Maya's Tale (17: With A Gun)

by

Kenshin

Seeing the captive Kitajima Maya, Hiei could not help thinking of his sister Yukina. Yukina had once been imprisoned by the human thug Tarukane Gonzo.

He stopped himself. The memory made him angry, and to deal with the situation, he needed a clear head.

Almost shoulder-to-shoulder, they stood in tense, wary silence, Hiei on the left, Shay-san in the middle, Kurama to her right, the door at their backs.

Kitajima Maya stared at nothing, her mouth open in silent distress as she floated above the gurney. With her white gown trailing, she inhabited a secret world of horror and despair.

From behind the girl, as if using her for a shield, a dark foreign man regarded them with disdain.

A circle of small photographs rotated just above man and girl like the rings of Saturn.

Acid-yellow walls to sear the vision. Black rubber floor to make moves tricky. The round, windowless room was about 35 feet in diameter, its very shape within the square house a paradox.

Not an ideal place to fight a battle for a girl's life, but you didn't always get to choose your arena.

The room offered little in the way of cover, all of it near the enemy, and therefore to his advantage.

The gurney was in the middle of the room. A table of foul-smelling, bubbling labware stood within the man's easy right-hand reach, and a tray of gleaming surgical tools lay at his elbow.

Kurama might be able to tell what some of the chemicals were. He would surely know the meaning of those razor-edged surgical tools.

Some ten feet behind the man, in what would be a corner if the room had corners, clothes had been tossed carelessly onto a metal folding chair.

They had blown their chance to rush the foreigner. He was too close to the girl for that to work anyway.

The foreigner sighed, then spoke in heavily-accented Japanese, his voice deep, sonorous, and self-assured. "No one knows how to dress these days."

He didn't sound crazy. But you never knew.

_Do I have enough speed to grab that girl before he can react? Everything else is secondary: who he is, if he gets away._

They should not have been standing so close together. If they were spread out, the foreign man's attention would be divided, and that would work in their favor. But their moment of shock on seeing the girl had cost them the element of surprise.

They would have to work with anything they could grab now to use as an edge, to tip the situation to their advantage.

What sort of man was this, human or youkai? Hiei's Jagan wasn't functioning either; he could not probe the man's mind.

The photos that surrounded Maya and the foreigner were moving too fast to study, but Hiei glimpsed images of the girl as the pictures twirled past. And some of the photos on the walls had been torn in half so Maya was the only person in them.

The perp reminded Hiei of Toad.

The foreigner raised a thick eyebrow. "And, unless I am very much mistaken, is this not the little boy from before, and his inquisitive, door-pushing friend?"

_From before? How does he know us? Wait-no, it couldn't be! 'Door-pushing?' Is he working with Muktananda?_

"I appear to have misjudged you," he went on," eyeing them sourly. "You did not heed my warning. However, I cannot allow you to interfere. I am almost there."

_Almost where? Don't like the sound of this._

Palming an eyedropper filled with day-glow orange fluid, the foreigner steadied Maya with one hand, then turned her face-up. With the eyedropper aimed into her parted lips, he expelled one, two, three drops.

Kurama seethed, and Hiei needed no psychic powers to detect this. But he also knew Kurama had not been himself this past week. How would that effect his judgment?

"That dress." Shayla Kidd spoke in English. "Not the sort of thing Maya would wear. And there's a folding chair with a green sweatshirt on it."

Shay-san had used an excellent tactic, mentioning a detail in itself not crucial. If the man did not react, they could speak freely without being understood.

Hiei raised the stakes. "Kurama, you know this bastard?"

All Kurama's attention was on Maya's captor. "No. But I heard his voice once."

The foreign man chuckled. "Let us lay our cards on the table, shall we?" He spoke in perfect, if accented, English.

_So much for that gambit._

"What's your name?" asked Hiei. "Just so long as we are laying cards on some table or other."

"I see no harm in this." His hand trailed through the girl's hair. "Here, I go by Von Brandt."

Aliases, then. A past, crowding up to his front door, maybe from continents away. "Nothing's happened so far," said Hiei. "Nothing we can't forget once we leave."

"With the girl," Shay-san added.

The foreign man gave her a dismissive glance. "Is that even female? It dresses like a boy."

Though she did not reply to the insult, there was a subtle shift in Shayla Kidd that Hiei sensed but could not define.

"The girl," continued Hiei. "Let's work something out."

Von Brandt palmed another eyedropper, this time containing black fluid. This he measured out into the girl's open eye, tap, two, three.

From Kurama came a barely audible hiss.

"Temper, temper, my boy," said Von Brandt. "You fail to realize how momentous is the occasion."

"We don't have to understand," said Hiei. "We just have to leave with the girl."

Von Brand smiled. "This, I cannot allow."

Hiei had talked people out of doing stuff before. He didn't have a lot of hope here, but he gave it a shot.

"All we want's the girl, and you can go on doing whatever it is you do in here." That was a lie, of course, and both he and the foreigner knew it, but it was a card that had to be played. "Suppose you tell us what that is, and we can strike a bargain. Are you human, or youkai?"

"Both. Neither." A note of pride rang in the deep sonorous voice. "I am me."

"Not from Japan?" Hiei asked. They had naturally assumed certain roles. Hiei would do the interrogation. Shayla Kidd would try to use the information. Kurama-

With the most at stake, Kurama would pit his intellect and will against Von Brandt, whose powers were unknown.

Von Brandt had been hesitating. "My home is called Mount Onyx," he replied at last. "Cold and remote and scarred with crevices and crags. The very trees are twisted, dead, deformed by wind and hail."

His pale eyes took on a faraway look, but he shook it off immediately. "A place of great beauty, but you will not have heard of it. I did not wish it to be known."

"Where is it?"

"Somewhere on the Continent," he said impatiently, shooting the sulfurous, bubbling glassware a sidewise glance. Somewhere, a timer dinged.

"And you need this girl because..."

"Because she is my chosen one," Von Brandt snapped.

_I figured._ "Chosen for what?"

"To be the mother of the new race."

The glassware bubbled on. That girl continued to float. And Hiei said, in a voice smooth as silk, "New race?"

"Not so much new, perhaps, as an improvement." The baleful eyes relaxed into thoughtfulness again. "But yes. Eventually. A new race to populate a new earth."

This time, it was Shay-san who hissed a breath.

Hiei said, over the exhalation, "Why do you do this?"

Von Brandt heaved another sigh. "Why does one do anything? To improve the breed by combining the best traits of both human and youkai. Youkai are tough, stubborn, rebellious, but possess arcane powers. Humans are frail, weak, but-malleable."

_Michael and Cecila are half-and-half. Smith-the guy Kurama works for-is, too. Doesn't this guy realize that human/youkai crosses already exist? Man and woman get together, and you gladly take whatever comes of it._ "And what happens to the girl?"

"The girl? That remains to be seen." Von Brandt moved to his labware, fumbling among the equipment. This took him a yard or so from the girl, his attention on the flasks.

_Now?_ Hiei coiled himself to leap.

But the bastard swiftly turned back, placing his hands on Maya to steady her, gazing down at her with his thick lips curving in a half-smile. "Perhaps this one will survive. She is quite lovely, and for her to witness her part in this great deed... yes, that would please me..." He trailed off, running a finger against her cheek.

Willing Kurama to remain calm, Hiei said, "Explain."

"The last batch went wrong." Von Brandt seemed content to elaborate now. "They disobeyed me. I commanded one, and one only among them, to go forth into the neighborhood and test her powers on the frightened peasants. But they all went forth at once, and were all destroyed at once."

Questions flew through Hiei's mind: _Last batch...? Destroyed...? Has he already done something irreversible to that girl?_ He brushed the questions aside. _Next time he turns to that witch's cauldron of glassware, I'm taking her._

"You see..." Von Brandt slipped a big hand around Maya's wrist, felt for her pulse. "My new creatures had no self-control. I admit that I may have made an error in the selection of their mother, but I am confident that this batch will prove a bit more amenable to obeying my orders."

"You've done this before?"

Von Brandt released the girl's wrist. He flicked a scornful glance at Hiei. "Are you as ignorant as you seem? It takes a good deal of time to do the research, discover why the experiments fail. You will not know this either, but Edison failed a hundred times before inventing the light bulb."

He still sounded sane. That was the worst kind of crazy.

"I had thought that a half-human mother would provide the sort of creatures who would listen to reason, but that was a mistake, I know now. No, I needed a fully human girl in order to breed in the ideal degree of docility combined with great destructive power. And it was not until recently that I found the perfect subject."

_He's not letting us go,_ Hiei realized. _That's why he's telling us all this. It will end in ashes._

They should have moved farther apart. They should be standing at different angles of the room, making the guy track each of them. With a gun and a sword and some distance they stood a chance, but not frozen together like this.

Kurama hadn't said a word since they had given up on English. Now he did. Though he spoke softly and with great calm, there was a note in his voice that drove a spike of ice down Hiei's back. "Give us the girl."

Von Brandt chuckled. "Do you wish to offer a sacrifice?"

The question lingered like smoke. Then Shayla Kidd lit with eagerness. "Yes," she said. "That's right. A sacrifice. Take me instead."

Some primitive instinct boiled up in Hiei and clawed at his reason. He wanted to shout, _No!_

But was his Firebird merely using another tactic, buying time, waiting for the odds to shift, giving them a chance?

Von Brandt fingered the hem of the girl's gown, then let the material drop. He spoke of Shayla Kidd, but as though she was not there. "That one? She flatters herself."

Hiei had to play for time, too. "Why?"

Von Brandt ran a big hand down Maya's cheek. Then he reached into the instrument tray and grabbed a hypodermic needle filled with bile-green fluid. He raised the hypo, squirted a green drop from its tip, then placed it on the gurney. "She has already been bred. I need not only beauty, not only a certain aura, but utter purity."

And with those words, Shayla Kidd took action. She reached into her roomy sweat jacket. The Beretta seemed to materialize in her hand, and she had a bead on Von Brandt.

-30-

(To be continued: A curse to strip the walls of paint.)


	18. Dead Man Walking

Please read Disclaimer in Chapter One.

Title: Maya's Tale (C18: Dead Man Walking)

Author: JaganshiKenshin

Genre: Action/Adventure, General

Rating: K+/PG-13 (for anime-style fight scenes/language)

Summary: Kurama and his allies must make a terrible choice.

A/N: I appreciate your reviews and thanks for reading this tale!

Though the odds are now 3 to 1, Maya remains in grave danger

Maya's Tale (18: Dead Man Walking)

by

Kenshin

Shayla Kidd on the end of a gun was a chilling sight.

The gun itself was a .32-caliber Beretta. It didn't have a lot of stopping power, nor much kick, but she was braced for shooting with a two-handed grip. Hiei knew her aim was true.

The bullets were also treated with grains of Holy Salt. If Von Brandt was a youkai, she would not even need accuracy. The shot merely had to hit him, somewhere.

All well and good-but her shocking gambit may have been a fatal error.

The gun's reflection flashed in Von Brandt's glacier-pale eyes, and even in his heavy coat, he moved lightning-quick. He dropped the hypo, scooped Maya from her floating position into a tight grip, close to his ribs. In the other hand, a scalpel materialized as quickly as Shayla Kidd had drawn her Beretta.

With the scalpel pressed against the soft flesh of the girl's throat, Von Brandt leered at them.

With smug self-assurance, he intoned, "What makes you believe I will hand over my property to the likes of you?"

Hiei's twitching hand longed for the comfort of his sword. From the corner of his eye he saw Kurama's jaw clench.

Kitajima Maya did not flop as an unconscious girl would. Von Brandt's dark influence kept her ironing-board stiff, her head upright, her feet dangling off the ground. In contrast to the deranged vitality of her captor, she was helpless, vulnerable, and unaware of the terrible danger.

But Kurama's eyes glittered with a hard emerald flame. Hiei had seen that look before, in the Dark Tournament, when that fool of a sickle-handed youkai had threatened Kurama's mother.

_Von Brandt,_ Hiei thought: _Dead man walking._

Ever so casually, Kurama raised a hand toward his hair as if to scratch an itch.

Von Brandt spread his thick lips in a mocking grin. "Little boy, this tactic of yours is indeed ill-advised." However subtle Kurama's move has been, Von Brandt had seen it. "But please-do try if you like. Just be prepared of the consequences." The scalpel flashed a deadly warning.

Kurama slowly lowered his hand.

"A wise move, for once," said Von Brandt. "Your powers have been sealed."

"Seal this, you bastard." In a spasm of anger, Hiei shrugged off his jacket and drew his sword, flipping it into an overhand grip as he had done with the Bartholomew tree.

Armed at last, he felt a burst of renewed hope, as bracing as a cold slap of water. With gunslinger Shayla Kidd, and Kurama waiting for the moment, they might yet win.

Von Brandt's baleful eyes narrowed. Maneuvering the girl to shield his body, Von Brandt growled, "Drop it or she dies."

Hiei hesitated. "She dies anyway. And you need her."

"As do you." Von Brandt's white fingers did not appear to move, but a bead of blood welled on Maya's throat, tinting the silver scalpel crimson.

"I'm calling your bluff." Every fiber aching with the savage need to act, Hiei gripped the sword so hard his hand hurt.

"Hiei!" Kurama's voice cracked with tension.

But this was a showdown between only Von Brandt and Hiei. "Don't just drop that sword at your feet," Von Brandt ordered, "But where you will be unable to reach it."

As though Von Brandt knew Hiei could easily flip his sword back into his hand using just the tip of his toe...

Throw it at Von Brandt now? Hiei was quick and accurate. He had practiced on that damned tree.

But there was a big difference between hitting a large, stationery target like a dead tree, and threading the needle here so as not to hurt the girl. And with the girl in front, the coward using her for a shield-

"Hiei..." Kurama warned.

Kurama lacked the power to summon a Rose Whip. With a single Command, Shayla Kidd could stop this guy cold, but her powers were suppressed as well, or she would have told him to freeze the minute they entered the room.

Hiei was itching to risk the spear gambit.

"_Hiei,_" Kurama rasped.

"Do it," Von Brandt boomed. "Or she dies now!" He gave the unconscious girl a shaking as a man would shake his fist.

With great reluctance, Hiei lowered his sword. Hating to disarm, he tossed his sword to the right, well past Kurama. It landed with a disheartening clunk on the black rubber floor.

Then-

Shayla Kidd was in front of him somehow, the Beretta pointed at Von Brandt's head. Her lips skinned back in an animal snarl, she switched to English. "All I need is one bullet to blow your _ brains out."

A muscle in Von Brandt's cheek twitched. "You-"

"Shut up! I dress like a boy, remember?" As venomous as a spitting cobra, she started in with curses that should have stripped the acid-yellow paint from the walls.

To all appearances, this was a woman who had taken an insult and fanned it to a bonfire of insane fury. But Hiei knew her well enough to realize this was no mere fit.

Nor was this Spellcasting. No Command, which would have caused Von Brandt to drop that girl, but might also leave them paralyzed for precious seconds. This was not even Suggestion. Just Shayla Kidd's stagecraft, pure and simple.

From a couple of clues dropped by Von Brandt, from his remarks on their manner of dress, from his manhandling the girl, Shayla Kidd had discerned the sort of man he was and leapt on a strategy to distract him.

The stakes had been tripled. Shayla Kidd's rash action in drawing the gun and Hiei's out-of-reach sword balanced against Von Brandt's scalpel at the girl's throat.

_Work with her,_ Hiei thought, _and we might stand a chance._ He said in a low, warning voice, "Don't do this-"

"No!" She called Hiei a filthy name. "I'll do whatever the _ I want, and I want this creep dead!"

Von Brandt's nostrils whitened.

"But Maya could get hurt," Hiei said.

"Maya?" Holding steady aim on Von Brandt, she shrieked an insane laugh. "Who gives a _?"

Von Brandt's icy gaze was locked on Shayla Kidd. "Do you think that gun will stop me?"

"Wanna find out? I can drill a bullet right through your eye." Her finger tightened on the trigger.

"And should you move your finger by so much as a single millimeter more, I will cut the girl's throat!"

"With your head blown off? Your brains will be decorating the wall before your spinal cord knows what hit it!"

Von Brandt's lips moved. "Put... the... gun... down."

"Make me,_."

But Shayla Kidd did not use such language. Even when vase-throwing mad at Hiei, she was much more creative than just that.

Her vile language was his first clue, but Hiei knew for certain she was playing a strategy from the moment she said she did not care what happened to Maya.

"Think you stand a chance?" There was a rhythm to her words, a code to her speech that was suggestive to another Shadow Warrior, but unrevealing to an enemy. "Come on," she snarled. "Try me. Take a chance. Go ahead, take it!"

_Take a chance._ The directive couldn't have been more clear to Hiei if it was splattered on the wall in black paint.

Hiei edged away from Shay-san. Beside him, Kurama shifted.

Hiei and Kurama had worked together in silent concert countless times: against Dr. Ichigaki's thugs at the Dark Tournament, against Old Dragon, and, before they even knew one another's moves well, against the demon Yatsude who, nearly ten years ago, had held Maya hostage.

Shayla Kidd continued to hurl invective. Von Brandt's cheek twitched. She was squeezing the trigger.

For this to work, everyone's timing must be perfect.

Hiei could not so much as flick a glance Shay-san's way, but had to put all their hopes into his own speed and Kurama's skill.

That band of photos that revolved around Von Brandt and the girl. They might get in the way. But Hiei could dodge a bullet at close range. He could do this.

Gathering himself like a coiled spring, Hiei waited.

The gunshot roared like a bomb. Glass exploded.

_Now._

He teleported forward. The photos snatched at him. Hiei tore the girl from Von Brandt's grasp. His momentum hurled him toward the far wall.

He tucked into a roll. His shoulder slammed the wall and he crashed to the ground, but he kept his grip on the girl.

Blood and cordite tainted the air.

He placed Maya's rag-doll form on the floor, then reached for the meager protection of the folding chair and pulled it over to shield her as far as possible.

Now-to assist Kurama.

Kurama was picking his way over broken glass to where Maya lay. Hiei couldn't see Von Brandt at first. And then he could.

It was probably best that Maya's eyes were shut.

And though Maya had not seen the results of Kurama's work, Shayla Kidd had. Her bone-white face reflected it.

There was a smoking, bubbling ruin of laboratory flasks. Hiei skirted the mess to where his Firebird stood, gun still pointed at the table.

She had done what she had to do-diverted Von Brandt's attention, shot wide at the last moment, hit the glassware. Hiei had grabbed Maya with pin-point timing. While Kurama-

Shayla Kidd gave a hoarse squeak. Hiei caught her as she toppled to her knees.

He was not demonstrative, and they both knew it. But to hell with that. "I got you," he whispered. "That's my girl."

The Beretta fell from her nerveless hand.

Hiei retrieved it for her. "Need to puke?"

She shook her head.

"Need a drink?"

"F-from this hellhole?" With trembling hands, she took the gun from Hiei and managed to get it back in its holster. "Maya! I-is she-did you-"

He helped her to her feet. "This way. Don't look until I tell you."

The Thrashvine, which Kurama had used in concert with Hiei when they had taken down the Bartholomew tree, needed only the lowest level of spirit power. It was something that would work when all else failed.

Summoned from Kurama's hair, the vine had surged forward in tandem with Hiei's leap. Wrapping itself around Von Brandt, tightening, it had literally cut him to pieces.

What was left of Von Brandt was mercifully hidden behind the gurney.

Glass crunched underfoot as Hiei helped guide Shay-san past the body, over to Kurama and Maya.

"You can look now."

Kurama was on his knees, Maya lying beside him, his long russet hair hiding his face.

Hiei could have sworn Maya had been alive when he had whisked her away.

The spinning photos of Maya had fallen, released from their grotesque sorcery. They littered the floor like autumn leaves.

The photos on the wall remained. The weight of that girl's images, the pictures taken without her knowledge or consent, stared down at them.

Shayla Kidd had opened her eyes. She bit her knuckle. For a few moments, she regarded Kurama and Maya. She put out a hesitant hand, but drew it back. "Kurama?"

Kurama did not look at them. "I tried everything," he said. "She won't wake up."

Hiei gazed at the ghost-pale girl sprawled on the black rubber floor, dressed as for a wedding.

Once, he would not have been able to feel pity for her, but Yukina's capture had provided a pathway for the softening of his heart. His muscles twitched as if attached to live wires.

He clenched his fists. _All this for nothing?_

The reek of sulfur and blood was almost a taste.

"Then we have no choice," he heard himself say. "It's back to Toad's palace."

-30-

(To be continued: Can Toad's strange powers awaken Maya?)


	19. Toadheart

Please read Disclaimer in Chapter One.

Title: Maya's Tale (C 19: Toadheart)

Author: JaganshiKenshin

Genre: Action/Adventure, General

Rating: K+/PG-13 (for anime-style fight scenes/language)

Summary: Toad in the garden, Maya at his mercy.

A/N: _Idiot Beloved_ takes place shortly after the Dark Tournament; _Firebird Sweet_ directly follows that timeline. For certain character development to make sense, you might read those fics in order. I appreciate your reviews!

"You must pierce his true heart."

Maya's Tale (19: Toadheart)

by

Kenshin

Maya burned with fever.

She had been death-pale and death-cold when they took her from the Von Brandt house. Now, in the back seat of the car, Kurama holding on to her, Shayla Kidd on one side-

_That hypo..._Kurama wondered, _what was in it? _

The night tore past as they hurtled away from the quiet residential neighborhood.

"Come on, Kitajima Maya. Brace up. Fight this. Come on." Shayla Kidd's Spellcaster voice in the low dark of the car, urging, cajoling. Kurama didn't stop her.

_She had to do it. Draw that gun. Just as Hiei had to draw his sword. All of it inevitable. But those chemicals... couldn't identify them by smell, no idea how to counter their effects... did Maya get any of what was in that hypo?_

Maya's right hand clenched and un-clenched, then relaxed. Her face burned scarlet. Sweat spangled her brow. Her eyelids flickered, as though the eyes beneath them struggled to open, and a thin whimper, little more than a sigh, escaped her lips. She was clearly in distress, but even away from Von Brandt's residence, even with his powers restored, Kurama could do nothing for her.

He dared not try some remedy that would surely backfire, given the unknown nature of what that monster Von Brandt had done to her, whether through poisoning, enthrallment, or whatever else pressed her down into the twilight depths of sleep.

Headlights stabbed away the dark as Hiei hurled the car onward in grim swift silence. He drove fast, but not fast enough for Kurama.

Residential neighborhoods melted away. Bars of light and shadow crawled across Maya's fevered face as they entered the heart of the city. Then the slow agony of twisting, turning streets leading to Toad's Palace.

_Hurry,_ thought Kurama, _hurry._

0-0-0-0-0

This time, Toad was in the garden.

Hiei had not seen the garden before.

Through the living room, past its unsavory tank filled with Slowpokes, it lay outside a pair of French doors, through which Kurama carried the girl, pale and still again after the fevered agitation she had suffered in the car.

They stepped into a semi-circular pavilion about 25 feet in diameter, with a flat roof and a floor of sand-colored paving stones. The pavilion's outer rim was marked with six granite pillars set at regular intervals.

Beyond the pavilion, white marble statues and geometrical topiaries dotted a green expanse of lawn. Half the length of a football field away bristled the edge of a forest.

The greenery seemed real, smelled real. The clouds looked white and solid as lambswool. But while the emerald lawn and balmy air spoke of spring, the leaves of the trees blazed red and gold and orange.

What a pleasant place this would be under normal circumstances. You could almost believe in a country estate, set like a jewel in a backdrop designed by the Almighty , and though the fresh air and the green scents should have calmed Hiei, they did not.

For something about the garden made him uneasy. Something about the incongruity of open territory within a building that was a wreck outside. Something about blue skies, when it was nearing midnight.

Of course, he disliked Toad in general.

Back at the Von Brandt house, Shayla Kidd had shot her bolt, and Hiei was man enough to want to spare her further exertion. He put her well behind himself and Kurama, and this time, she stayed there.

The girl in Kurama's arms still wore that off-putting bridal gown, and while Shayla Kidd had the foresight to gather Kitajima Maya's own clothes from the folding chair, no one was going to waste time getting her into them.

On the edge of the pavilion, where stone met grass, Toad sat waiting on a marble bench: a dry-skinned amphibian the size of a man, all warts and claws and olive-brown skin, wearing a robe of pale blue silk that exposed his soft, yellowish throat. The effect was even more hideous in natural light, if you could call this light natural.

He rose from the bench and came forward to greet them.

"Give her to me," said Toad, in that beautiful voice so at odds with his squat ugly body.

Kurama seemed reluctant to hand the girl over, but he did it anyway, then stepped back to stand beside Hiei.

Toad cradled the girl in his arms, studying her, a distasteful sight: Bride of the Monster.

At last Toad looked up. The pale soft throat worked. "She has-been-like this for-how long?"

"No more than an hour," Kurama replied. "Since we defeated Von Brandt."

"I think we should burn the damned house," said Hiei, and was rewarded by Toad's attention, the gold-and-black eyes gleaming like spoiled raindrops.

Hiei's spine stiffened. His muscles twisted together. _As if I'm getting ready to fight him._

"Back then, Hiei," said Toad, "when you first saw this girl. What did you think of her?"

Only brutal candor would serve. "She was in the way."

"So you tried to kill her?"

"No. She wasn't the target." Hiei got the unpleasant notion that somehow Toad was feeding on his words. "Kurama was."

"But you would have gone through her without hesitation," Toad continued.

Hiei matched him stare for stare. "If you know the answer-why ask?"

Toad dismissed Hiei with a glance. His pale, sticky tongue darted out and made a circuit of the lipless amphibian mouth. Then, with an eerie, acquisitive gleam in his eye, he spoke to Shayla Kidd. "And you, my lovely Spellcaster."

Hiei found his fists clenching. He watched Shayla Kidd from the corner of his eye.

"You only met the girl just recently, but still..." Toad gave Shay-san an eager look. "What are your thoughts?"

"Cute," she replied. "Smart. Enthusiastic. But beneath all that enthusiasm, angry."

"Why?"

There was a slight hesitation that only Hiei might notice, an inward-turning of Shay-san's gaze. Perhaps she also sensed what Hiei sensed, that the toad was in some way feeding on their answers, and also found it repellent. "I never got the time to find out."

"And you?" Toad did not mention Kurama by name, but there was no one else to ask.

"That," Kurama said slowly, his eyes on Toad, "is something Maya herself should answer."

Toad made a gobbling noise, deep in his throat. The sound raised Hiei's hackles. As Toad studied the girl in his arms, Hiei noticed that the jewel in his head wasn't emitting its usual fluorescent glow.

Because they were not in that curtained living room but standing under blue sky?

Toad's arms shook, as though Maya grew heavier by the moment. But the girl didn't weigh all that much more than featherweight Shayla Kidd.

After a lip-licking pause, Toad said, "She does not appear to be capable. And I think that even if you burn the house, it may not bring this girl back."

"What _will_ bring her back?" With a swift glance toward the forest, Kurama spoke in a calm, level voice.

Toad blinked his gold-black eyes again and again. It seemed a strain to hold the girl; she drooped in his arms, his legs quivered, and he took a staggering step away from them.

He spoke in a hoarse whisper, but still they heard his words: "I th-think th-that you must find this Von Brandt's true heart, and... destroy it."

"Destroy his true heart?" Hiei scowled. "What the hell are you talking about? We left him in pieces!"

The air around Kurama turned winter-cold. Rage? Hiei wondered, resolve? But Kurama stood as still as one of the marble statues dotting the lawn.

Then, without warning, he gave a flick of his russet hair. A long blade of grass, forged hard as diamond, leapt from the tangle of locks, slashed sidewise, and neatly sliced Toad's head from his body.

-30-

(To be continued: Has Kurama lost his mind? )


End file.
